By Edward C Hixson, the @one Alliance
The context
Colour Vision Deficiency (CVD), also known as Colour Blindness, is a common variation in humans that can lead to difficulties in distinguishing colours. It is predicted that three million people in Britain are colour blind, roughly 4.5% of the population. There are three different types of CVD – protanopia, deuteranopia and tritanopia – which all act slightly differently. Of these, the most common is deuteranopia which affects the perception of red and green. It is key that we understand and adapt our work within the GIS profession to make sure we improve accessibility for all. Visualization is key within GIS (Geographic Information Systems) as we are constantly deciding how we want our maps to look and how we want to communicate our message to our users. This is where our CVD strategy comes into play, as we need to make sure our data is clear and communicates it messages to everyone.
The @one Alliance is a partnership of companies which deliver the £1.25 billion investment programme of Anglian Water in the East of England, from the south of the Humber down to the edge of London, covering both Norfolk and Suffolk. These companies are involved in delivering water to new areas through new pipeline schemes, building nature-based solutions to help filter water, and building new reservoirs to help with water scarcity. With over 1200 employees, 330 of these work within ArcOnline which is our GIS platform. Sources state one in 12 men and one in 200 women have Colour Vision Deficiency (CVD) and in a colour dependent environment such as GIS, this has a significant impact on the workforce. We need to make sure that our maps are of a high enough standard in quality and visualisation to aid our teams in the delivery of 700+ projects across the region. To achieve this aim, we launched a project to improve the accessibility of our main mapping solution, the Solution Web App.
The Solution Web App is used throughout the design phase of our projects, which can include cross-country pipelines and above-ground works. It also acts as our one stop shop for data, where we can view environmental data such as nature reserves and flood risk areas, utility data of pipelines and electricity cables, or the most recent census data. It is integral to mapping data on ecological constraints or health and safety risks both for internal project assessments and communication, and for representing data for external stakeholders. The Solution Web App contains 130+ different layers and is vital in allowing the Alliance to make informed decisions. To make sure that our maps are CVD compliant we needed to build an internal process. This needed to utilise several different tools such as ArcGIS Pro’s Colour Vision Deficiency simulator which emulates the impact of being colour blind, ESRI documentation, browser add-ons, and research to build an internal CVD compliance strategy.
Our actions
In the seven months of this project, we have altered 15% of colours associated with our most used layers and made alterations to the Solution Web App. We made changes to all possible data within the Solution Web App meaning that anyone with CVD can confidently complete visual analysis and assessments for any project. The data altered includes key environmental layers, which used red and green to communicate their messages. Red and green are frequently used colours to communicate messages within GIS around carbon, environmental risk, and health and safety, but they are two of the most problematic colours regarding CVD. It is also worth noting that data colours cannot always be altered, for example indicating health and safety risks using red and green is so engrained within our industry that we need to consider alternatives solutions to this problem. This can cause significant difficulties when working with GIS, for instance if you have a person with CVD completing some analysis on where a new pipeline is to be placed and built. If this pipeline runs through red and amber risk zones for Sites of special scientific interest and Local Nature reserves, can we be confident that a mistake won’t be made here? Chances are that this will be picked up at a later stage, which could waste both time and money, but in the worst-case scenario such mistakes could have significant impacts on the environment and worker safety due to the inability to distinguish between data sets. This exemplifies how the use of colour in regard to GIS data which is non-CVD compliant can impact day-to-day work within the utility and construction industry. Data from our Solution Web App has been viewed nearly 250,000 times over the past three and a half years. Improving the CVD accessibility of our GIS system will therefore have had a significant impact on those making decisions based on this data.
The future for accessibility within GIS
This project is just one example of work being done to improve accessibility within GIS. Moving forward, we need to make sure that this process is consistently followed and applied to all further data, widgets, tools and web applications that we produce or procure. As mentioned earlier within this blog, there are also certain pockets of data that cannot be altered, such as health and safety. For this we need to consider new and unconventional ways to alter our data not just in colour but in symbology. Actions like this need to be completed carefully to make improvements for the few while not impacting the many, allowing for everyone to benefit. Beyond CVD, the GIS world is considering accessibility in terms of neurodiversity and the experiences of people with autism, ADHD or dyslexia within geospatial workplaces. Tailoring topographic maps for the blind and visually impaired was also a discussion at the 2023 UK ESRI conference. There is still far to go, but sharing best practice within the community can help to make the use of geospatial data more accessible for all.
About the author: Edward C Hixson is a GIS Data Technician at the @one Alliance (Anglian Water).
Suggested Further Reading
Havlick, D.G. & Dao, T.H.D. (2023) Revealing vertical geopolitics: Quantifying the volume of militarised restricted airspaces in the USA using GIS. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/tran.12614
Page N, Langford M, Higgs G. (2019) Exploring spatiotemporal variations in public library provision following a prolonged period of economic austerity: A GIS approach. Area. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/area.12575
How To Cite
Hixson, E. (2024, 10 April) How Colour Vision Deficiency impacts decision making and accessibility through GIS analysis within the utility industry. Geography Directions. https://doi.org/10.55203/TNXC5005
Geography Directions 