Do VLMs See What Sensors Feel? A Scalable Expert-Guided Design for Wheelchair Accessibility Assessment from Street View

Abstract

Assessing built-environment interaction, such as wheelchair accessibility, is challenging because real-world mobility is shaped by context-dependent and temporary barriers that are difficult to capture at scale. This paper examines whether vision-language models (VLMs) can identify potential accessibility barriers from Google Street View (GSV) imagery. We propose an expert-guided retrieval-augmented framework that combines GSV imagery, ADA-informed guidance, and expert-derived rubrics to evaluate multiple accessibility dimensions. We collect a campus-scale dataset at the University of Florida, linking 407 unique GSV locations with GPS-derived wheelchair dwell behavior as a proxy for potential mobility friction. Results show that VLM ratings are negatively correlated with dwell time and exhibit distributional similarity, with the expert-guided configuration strengthening the correlation from $r=-0.40$ to $r=-0.54$ for the strongest model. Visual cue analysis further shows that features such as curb ramps and crosswalks are associated with higher VLM accessibility scores, while correspondence remains limited for subtle surface conditions, transient obstructions, and viewpoint-dependent barriers. Overall, our findings demonstrate the potential of expert-guided VLMs for scalable preliminary accessibility screening and prioritizing locations for further investigation.

arXiv commentAccepted to IEEE/CVF WACV 2027. 8 pages of main content, 2 pages of references