Accessible natural destinations; a myth for people with physical disabilities?

Abstract

According to the United Nations (2006), around ten percent of the world's population is living with a disability, which equates to approximately 650 million people worldwide (United Nations, 2006 in Lovelock, 2010). Within European Community, there are over 50 million people with some form of disability, whilst Britain alone encompasses an estimated 10 million people with a diverse range of impairments and disabilities (Lovelock, 2010; DWP, 2006 in Burns et al., 2009). Thus when looking at these figures, it seems that this share of the population is actually fairly significant. This paper aims to critically analyse tourism development for people with disabilities (PwD) and to evoke new discussion by considering the barriers facing disabled people in accessing natural destinations, whilst focusing on those with disabilities that influence to their physical mobility and thus their capability to participate in leisure travel and enjoy natural environments.

Keywords: disability; accessibility; constraint; natural environment

There are three main types of constraints affecting to participation in tourism activity: 'Intrapersonal', 'interpersonal' and 'structural' (Burns et al., 2009; Daniels et al., 2005; Yau et al., 2004; Smith, 1987). The last two constraints relate to attitudinal and socio-physical barriers and are seen as congruent with the social model of disability. This model argues that people with impairment are disabled and excluded by a society, which is careless about their needs and sets barriers to their participation (Hughes & Paterson, 1997). 'Intrapersonal' constraints are considered as psycho-emotional and impairment characteristics of the disabled person and it has been identified that these constraints are actually the greatest impediments to leisure participation as feelings of incapability in tourism activity may create feelings of helplessness which often reduce the future participation (Burns et al., 2009; Freudenberg and Arlinghause, 2010; Yau et al., 2004).

Therefore the issue of accessibility is a major obstacle especially in terms of natural destinations, where even the physical features often act as significant barriers for people with disabilities. Yet, if living within the urban environment is challenging for people with mobility disabilities as sometimes even a single bump on the road or narrow spaces can cause problems, it is extremely difficult to make natural environments accessible for everyone because these often include, for example, rough surface paths and after building a ramp or paved road in natural environment, it cannot be considered as natural anymore.

This also triggers conflicts between the different parties as happened in New Zealand where three companies developed plans to make Milford Sound, nation's one of the most valuable natural attraction, accessible also for people with mobility disabilities. As these plans included motorised transport (e.g. boat, bus, gondola) which would go through the natural landscapes, they received a lot of criticism from the environmental groups, and New Zealand's biggest environmental group Forest and Bird initiated 'Say no to the Gondola' campaign with posters reading, for example, 'National Parks not Theme Parks' (Lovelock, 2010).

Thus, managers of the wilderness areas have been among the last to meet the needs of tourists with mobility disabilities, partly due to the fact that it is often very expensive to overcome the physical barriers but also because they are aiming to protect the natural landscape. Furthermore, as very little is known of how disabled persons view and experience outdoors, tourism site managers are often poorly prepared to help individuals with disabilities (Daniels et al., 2004). This clearly illustrates that there is a lack of provision for disabled people in accessing the outdoors, which creates frustration and make them often feel that the countryside and wilderness areas are not for them (Burns et al., 2009).

During the recent decades, several legislative acts have been created to improve disabled people's rights. The most significant policy document concerning these rights can be considered to be the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (DDA) making it now 'illegal for service providers, including attractions and accommodation establishments, to discriminate against people with disabilities' (Shaw & Coles, 2004 pp.397). However, as there is no existing statutory requirement to improve the access to outdoors, it may be difficult for natural destinations to receive funding from public sector. Furthermore, many of the legislations and policies are still open to various interpretations and sometimes, for instance, access for those with disabilities is ruled by the 'reasonable modifications' requirement, which must not fundamentally alter the nature of the programme or services provided (Lovelock, 2010). Yet, it is extremely difficult to draw a line between what is reasonable and what is not, and thus the 'reasonable modifications' to improve the access of disabled may be easily challenged by some who may argue that the modifications alter park services and ruin the landscape (Skidmore, n.d in Lovelock, 2010 pp.359).

Therefore, if the natural attractions are to guarantee that they are fulfilling the needs of the disabled visitors in the services they provide, 'they must consult with disabled people and their organisations and ask them what it is what they want to do and what they feel safe doing' (Burns et al., 2009, pp 414). It may be that some of the physical barriers are impossible to overcome but as Smith (1987) stated, the combination of constraints influencing disabled travellers may decrease their travel satisfaction. Therefore it is crucial to remove at least those barriers that can be removed. However, this requires tourism professionals to do more than what is required by law, which is something that should be addressed and evaluated when creating new approaches, policies and guidelines for natural destinations.

References:
Burns, N. et al. (2009), 'An inclusive outdoors? Disabled people's experiences of countryside leisure services', Leisure Studies, Vol. 28 (4), 403-417

Countryside Agency (2005) By all reasonable means: Inclusive access to the outdoors for disabled people [online], Countryside Agency, http://naturalengland.etraderstores.com/NaturalEnglandShop/product.aspx?ProductID=c267e581-70d3-4164-9d28-03d25d282846, Accessed 1.5.2011

Lake District National Park (2010) Rights of Way Improvement Plan Delivery Report 2009-2010, [online], Lake District National Park, http://www.lakedistrict.gov.uk/lake_district_docs95/rowip_delivery_report_2009-10.pdf, Accessed 6.5.2001

Lovelock, B. A. (2010) 'Planes, trains and wheelchairs in the bush: Attitudes of people with mobility-disabilities to enhanced motorised access in remote natural settings', Tourism Management, Vol. 31, 357-366

Yau, M. et al. (2004) 'Travelling with disability, More than an Access Issue', Annals of Tourism Research, Vol. 31 (4), 946-960

Of a current topic with limited academic literature accessible, Kylänpää has effectively raised critical points on awareness issues for tourism-for-all, on the contradictory nature of the pursuits for accessibility in natural environments such as how the measures needed in order to implement tourism-for-all affect the atmosphere or the authenticity of a tourism site. Though much more has been done for less, such as the commercialisation of many tourism sites, where people go look for something an urban life cannot provide: peace, nature, primitiveness, etc. So why not for the accessibility of impaired individuals?

Agreeing with the rest of the literature Kylänpää pointed out how the impaired individuals are faced with various barriers many of which are imposed by the society's lack of awareness and slow realisation of a potentially great market possibility. The intrinsic (intrapersonal) barriers are said to be the greatest barrier in tourism participation for individuals with impairments (Yau et al. 2004), but are those intrinsic barriers of feeling helpless in fact caused by the lack of necessary information, awareness and infrastructure at the destination? With awareness training for staff a lot can be accomplished for more enjoyable and accessible tourism-for-all (Richards et al. 2010). More so many ramps and duckboards can be built from natural resources such as wood, which would not affect too extensively the natural environment but would enhance accessibility.

Many of the physical features of a natural environment pose accessibility challenges as Kylänpää stated, yet for example the rough surface can be accessible for mobility impaired individuals with assistance. Hiring more staff and carrying out improvements for accessibility can be expensive and as the author pointed out there are no existing statutory requirements for outdoors accessibility for impaired people hence getting funding can be difficult. But would it be worth it?

As the author mentions: "However, this requires tourism professionals to do more than what is required by law, which is something that should be addressed and evaluated when creating new approaches, policies and guidelines for natural destinations." It is not what has to be done, but what tourism professionals should want to do in order to ensure customer enjoyment. Therefore understanding the experiences of impaired people is required in order to develop the industry. When developing aspects of tourism infrastructure advisable is to get an opinion from, for example Impairment organisations, to see if the developed products or sites are accessible, and what suggestions would they have for further improvements.


References

Yau, M.; McKercher, B. and Packer, T. (2004) Traveling with a disability: More than an Access Issue, Annals of Tourism Research, 31(4) pp. 946-960

Richards, V.; Pritchard, A. and Morgan, N. (2010) (Re)Envisioning Tourism and Visual Impairment, Annals of Tourism Research, 37(4) pp. 1097-1116