Enhancing Accessibility in Academic Buildings: A Discrete Event Simulation Approach for Robotic Assistance

Abstract

The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) emphasizes the importance of a barrier-free environment, that ensures autonomy to perform any task for all individuals regardless of disabilities. This is particularly important in public administrations (academic centers, hospitals, transport stations, etc.), where governments must make sure that all citizens are equally catered for, being inclusive of all physical and mental conditions. Traditional approaches focused on architectural modifications for physical mobility fail to encompass all disabilities, leaving gaps in provisions for cognitive, visual, or hearing impairments. In this sense, solutions based on assistant robots represent promising results, yet investment risks require accurate predictions prior to implementation. In this sense, simulators perform a virtual representation of complex scenarios, ensuring that the system achieves the desired requirements before deployment. This paper presents the MoSTBuilding framework’s scenario simulation by applying a Discrete Event Simulation. The purpose of the simulation is to evaluate how robot assistant reduce task completion time for students in a variety of buildings. Results from two university building scenarios indicate a 35% and 42% reduction in travel time for students with and without disabilities. In another building with a high proportion of students with disabilities, the reductions are 30% and 37% for different types of students. This research demonstrates the substantial potential of integrating robotic assistance in academic settings to improve accessibility and efficiency, offering significant benefits for students, especially those with disabilities.