Kalona’s recent discussion on improving sidewalks hits close to home for resident Stanford Wilson.

He travels the sidewalks of Kalona by electric wheelchair — and has done so since 2011.

Shortly after moving to Kalona in 2009, Wilson was diagnosed with a form of acute leukemia and spent nearly a year in the hospital. 

The 80 days of arsenic treatment and subsequent recovery process left him weakened and unable to walk even short distances without a walker. 

He returned to Kalona, where he relied upon his electric wheelchair to get around town.

He has since upgraded his chair and allows his brother-in-law, Clay Stapleton, to borrow his older chair when the two go out together. Stapleton can walk but only limited distances.

“We just cruise,” Wilson said.

But it isn’t all smooth sailing for the two brothers.

Many sidewalks throughout town are in disrepair, while some streets do not have any sidewalk at all, forcing the pair to ride in the street or take long detours to get to their destination.

A lack of usable sidewalks in town is more than an inconvenience — for those like Wilson, it can be deadly.

“I’ve been run off the road once,” Wilson said. “It just happened. Someone had to help me get out.”

Stapleton recalled a time when he was hit by a truck on Highway 22.

“He knocked me six feet over,” he said, adding that the perpetrator stopped to help right his chair before hurriedly fleeing the scene.

The two have extensive knowledge on which streets are wheelchair-friendly and which should be avoided at all costs.

Sidewalks on Third and Fourth streets, as well as on C Avenue east of downtown, are among the least favorable for traveling.

“Them cracks on the cement are big. I gotta hit them just right or my wheels get stuck,” Wilson said.

The pair agree that the lack of sidewalks along Highway 22 poses one of the biggest challenges.

The two travel the shoulder of Highway 22 to get to JW’s Foods in order to avoid the dense gravel road along the back entrance to the store on D Avenue.

Along this route, the corner of Third Street and Highway 22 by Mercy Family Medicine Kalona poses the biggest hazard for the two.

The north shoulder of the highway narrows — and eventually cuts off — as it approaches Third Street from the west. Amish horse and buggies can get around it by cutting into lanes of traffic, but in a wheelchair, it is not that easy.

“With those big crevices in the road, it’s easy to get my wheel stuck,” Wilson said.

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