Dubbo's Cody Jones says disability, accessibility improvements making 'massive' difference

Mr Jones is a member of Dubbo Regional Council's Disability Inclusion Technical Panel. The panel was launched in 2018 to help identify problem areas throughout the region that are in need of being upgraded to modern accessible standards.

Council also created a Disability Inclusion Action Plan to outline the strategies and actions needed to improve Dubbo and Wellington.

It includes items like reviewing pedestrian crossings, investigating opportunities to enhance council playgrounds to include accessible equipment and investigating options for the production of a mobility map.

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Mr Jones is full of praise for the steps that have already been taken.

"For a lot of people it's little things that they don't notice like having those tactile things so someone who is low vision knows they need to stop or knows there's something coming up that they need to sidestep," he said.

"Having the ramps leading up to disabled toilets means carers are no longer having to struggle... It's those very small improvements but they're having a massive impact for people with disabilities."

One of the first things raised by the Disability Inclusion Technical Panel was for an accessible toilet in the main street. It lead to the instillation of the toilets at the Church Street rotunda.

Council has earmarked $2 million across four years to fund a range of projects. Work such as improved access in parks, the installation of tactile ground surface indicators and wider pedestrian ramps have already been undertaken.

Next year, council will install additional disabled toilets at the Macquarie Regional Library.

Dubbo mayor Ben Shields' goal is to make Dubbo the most disability-friendly city in Australia.

Mr Jones believes Dubbo is definitely leading a lot of other regions.

"It's the right goal for any community to have because by having a goal like that, it's saying accessibility and inclusion matters and the more communities and the more societies we have saying that, the easier it's going to be for the one in five Australians who have a disability or an accessibility problem," he said.

Cr Shields said the work done so far was "just a drop in the ocean" of what needed to be done to achieve his disability-friendly goal.

He said not only were the changes improving accessibility for disabled people, it was also making it easier for the elderly members of the population.

"There are so many different reasons why we should be doing this sort of infrastructure in the Dubbo region," the mayor said.

Council will create a new Disability Inclusion Action Plan in 2021.