Facilitare gli spostamenti urbani delle persone con disturbo dello spettro autistico (ASD): il caso studio di GAP REDUCE

The paper reports the results of a research and development project called GAP REDUCE aimed at developing a tool to provide support to adult and high-functioning people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in walking in the city to reach relevant destinations.
The tool allows the user to plan, easily and in advance, an urban itinerary towards daily destination.
After the development of a cognitive framework to deepen the recurring spatial needs of people with ASD two main activities have been developed in order to identify the urban spatial features acting as spatial facilitators or obstacles respectively, meaning the relative inclusion or exclusion in the calculation phase of the most suitable path for the user.
The first activity was a panel with experts of different disciplines fields and the second a mapping activity in order to test the practicability of the theoretical assumptions in a pilot area. To achieve this goal, the neighbourhood of Sacro Cuore in the city of Sassari (Italy) was selected.