There are a lot of ultramodern buildings in Quito, such as these.
There is plenty of new construction going on. But there are also a lot of broken and uneven sidewalks. And when accommodations for people with disabilities do exist, they’re frequently done poorly. Take this ramp, for example:
I’m not sure if this is even intended to be used by folks in wheelchairs; it’s possible that it’s mostly there for making deliveries with hand trucks. But this is much too steep for someone in a wheelchair to use.
This probably stands out to me mostly because I’m from the United States, where we’ve had a law in place for about 30 years that says newly built or newly renovated public accommodations need to be accessible to people with disabilities. Apparently the USA is a real outlier in mandating this. And it’s not really fair to hold Ecuador to a similar standard. But it would be nice if new construction would keep folks with disabilities in mind.
One example I saw was a man in a wheelchair on Avenida Nacionas Unidas. And I mean “on” quite literally. He was wheeling his chair on the asphalt, in the part meant for cars. I didn’t take a photo since that would seem rude, but my best guess is that the sidewalks are so uneven that wheeling his chair in an auto traffic lane was the least-bad option for him.