Blog

Brussels, 26 June 2018. VisitFlanders, the tourism authority of the Flemish Region of Belgium, hosted a gathering of tourism organisations and professionals at the launch of the new World Tourism for All Quality Programme.

Photo (Chris Veitch, ENAT): Kathleen Linehan, Gleneagle Group, receives the first three Accreditation certificates for the Maritime Hotel, The Brehon and the Gleneagle Hotel from ENAT President, Anna Grazia Laura.  From left to right: Paudie Healy, Universal Access, Ireland, Katerina Papamichail, Architect, ENAT, Ivor Ambrose, Managing Director, ENAT, Anna Grazia Laura, President, ENAT, Kathleen Linehan, HR and Employee Relations Manager, Gleneagle Group, Killarney, Ireland, Girma Anuskeviciute, Policy Officer, European Commission Tourism Unit, Linda Campbell, Registrar, Enterprise & Hospitality Development Officer, Failte Ireland. 

July 2016 marked the launch of ‘visits4u’, an 18 month project that aimed to improve user experience and sustain inclusive design provision across its partners. The consortium comprised of seven partners from six countries: Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Spain and the United Kingdom.

The pillar of the project has been to build capacity of the tourism sector across the partners’ regions through training activities that increased awareness and skills in developing inclusive tourism provision.

Following on from these activities, a series of online tools and resources has been developed, that are available for free via the project’s website:

Today, architects should not consider accessibility as a set of technical answers but as an architectural desire which gives everyone the feeling of being the same.

I am inspired by the principles of Universal Design, a method of designing accessible and inclusive spaces and environments suited to all users, regardless of their needs, size, age, motor, sensory and mental abilities.

For more than 15 years, I have been helping professionals in the hotel and tourism industry to develop comfortable and accessible rooms where it is pleasant to stay.

It simply requires ergonomics that respects comfort, safety, simplicity, ease, but certainly not in response to excessive standardization that has been frozen for over 50 years! According to my international experience as a wheelchair user, 90% of hotel rooms reserved for people with reduced mobility (PMR - Personne à mobilité Réduite) are only accessible with pain.

Chris Veitch, Consultant at Access New Business, Senior Researcher at ENAT interviewed by Ivor Ambrose, Managing Director, ENAT.

Pantou:  Chris, congratulations on being appointed as the UK Government’s "Disability Champion” for the tourism sector. What would you say are the main challenges facing the industry?