2007-07-24 - 5:35 p.m.
When we got off the ship in New York, at the Brooklyn cruise ship terminal in Red Hook, it took us an entire day to get a mile and a half. New York is amazingly unfriendly to people with disabilities. I mean, there are people in New York speaking almost 200 different languages. But if you use a wheelchair, apparently you�re S.O.L. and should get outta town. The experience only strengthened my resolve to in grad school explore the mystery of why some American cities are so wheelchair-friendly and others are so brutal.
The ship docked early in the morning. After all the passengers with disabilities were asked to assemble in a shipboard casino for some reason, we were let onto shore around 9AM. Nya and I had originally planned to stay at a high school friend�s mother�s house (thank you very much!). But when we called, her landline was annoyingly disconnected by a phone company screw up and we didn�t have her cell number. Hmm. We tried to remain calm and called Nya�s father for advice.
He told us not to panic. If we thought of a hotel we wanted to stay at, he would pay for it. He had promised us some money for the wedding, so this could be his wedding present to us (thank you!). We thought of the place we had stayed the last time we were in Brooklyn for Valentine�s Day. That hotel is within walking distance of Saint Ann�s, where we were going for the next day�s celebration (we actually would have gone there last time to revisit the old stomping grounds, but the school was closed for mid-winter break).
He got us a room and we went to go there. This was around 11AM. We figured we�d just call a cab company for a wheelchair-accessible taxi. I mean, that�s what you do in Chicago and a cab comes in like ten minutes (of course occasionally they never come, but those are rare instances). There were plenty of minivan cabs around, the kind that can easily be fitted with a roll-out ramp to make boarding in a chair a snap. We never gave the question of getting a cab a second thought.
Well. That may be how it works in Chicago buster, but around here in the Big City, things are a little different! The first few companies we called either said they didn�t have any wheelchair cabs or that it would be several hours wait for one. Then we called a place that said they�d be there in ten minutes. Hmm. We were a little dubious and asked if the vehicle was really accessible. It�s a minivan, replied the dispatcher. Yes, but does it have a boarding ramp? The dispatcher however had already hung up.
A half-hour later, the minivan came. We were waiting outside; fortunately, it was a nice day. The car stopped and the driver started rearranging the interior, collapsing seats to make more room. Well, that seemed promising. Although he hadn�t unrolled a boarding ramp yet. Usually there�s a ramp attached to the underside of a minivan that rolls out to make it no problem to go into the vehicle in a wheelchair. When he was done rearranging things, he turned to me.
�Okay, get in.�
Get in? The floor of the vehicle was at least 6� off the ground. Perhaps if I were in a manual wheelchair, someone could pull it into the minivan (backwards to lead with the big wheels). But unfortunately, I was in a motorized chair that weighed about 200 pounds. Even if I managed to get myself up the step and into the taxi, we�d still have to bring that heavy wheelchair up after me. Wait, I forgot about the anti-gravity device! I�ll just engage that and levitate into the cab! Alas, I couldn�t find the controls�
�Look, you have to be kidding me. I�d say I was sorry for wasting your time in you coming out here, but how can you seriously drive a �handicapped� taxi that wheelchairs can�t get in.�
The cabbie looked at me and shook his head sadly before driving off.
Well. I wish I�d actually been so calm and collected about it. Really, I was beside myself at this point. To top it off, my cell phone battery was dying. But who was left to call now, anyway?
From a dedicated landline, we called one of the companies we had talked to before that had an enormous wait time. They said they could get us a cab in two hours. We figured it was better to wait a long time than to never get there and said we�d take it. Even if it was getting on into the afternoon and we were looking pretty beat (plus, as I mentioned, I get pretty tired for a bit in mid-afternoon). We went inside the cruise terminal building to wait.
Now, a lot of Port Authority workers and police officers and other people who�d also been at the terminal all day had watched our ongoing travails with some sympathy. When we sat down in the building, one Port Authority guy offered us sandwiches.
�Here, one�s tuna and one�s cheese. I feel bad for you guys, waiting around all day.�
�I don�t get it. I mean, I wasn�t the only person in a wheelchair on the ship. What do other people with disabilities do?�
�I don�t really know. I think either someone picks them up or they arrange for a cab way in advance.�
We wolfed down our sandwiches; we didn�t realize how hungry we were. After an hour and a half, we went out front to wait for the cab. After two hours, it still hadn�t come. But we reminded ourselves not to panic yet. They might just be a bit late. After two and a half hours, we gave the taxi company a call again to see what was up. But when we gave them our contact number, they said they had no record of any trip associated with that number. Basically, they�d never heard of us.
Okay. Now seemed like a good time to panic. It was after 4 now. We had a hotel room, but no way to get there. This was insane! It was less than two miles away. Maybe at this point I should just scoot all the way over in my wheelchair. Nya could take our bags ahead in a regular cab. Yeah, that�s a plan. We�ll see how well curb cut the streets of Brooklyn are.
�Man, you guys are still getting hammered, huh? Gotta respect that you don�t quit.�
It was the Port Authority worker who�d given us sandwiches.
�Thanks. I was just thinking of going over to downtown Brooklyn on just wheelchair power. Guess that�s kind of stupid, huh.�
He laughed. �Listen, me and the guys feel real bad for you. We were talking about taking you over ourselves in a bit.�
�For real?�
�Straight up. We got a pickup with a hydraulic lift. We can put your chair up on that and put you and the lady in another car.�
And that�s how we got to our hotel. All it took was the sympathy and efforts of an entire team of workers from an interstate agency using specialized vehicles and equipment. Why is it like this? It would be easy to attribute Chicago�s accessibility vs. New York�s hostility to Midwestern friendliness vs. East Coast huffiness. But there must be a deeper reason. I�m going to graduate school to try and figure this out.
When they dropped us off, the Port Authority workers wouldn�t even accept a tip.
� 2007 Geoff Gladstone
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