New Travel Shows in 2005 to Keep Up with Emerging Market Demand

Travel symposiums for those with disabilities are scheduled in the UK at Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, and in the US in Baltimore, Maryland.


The trend goes by many names - accessible travel, inclusive travel, wheelchair-friendly travel, multi-sensory travel, barrier-free tourism, tourism for all. You can even break it down into specialties - travel for slow walkers, dialysis cruises, senior travel, medical tourism. Suddenly, the English-speaking world north of the equator has taken the lead from Australia – long the pioneer in barrier-free travel and tourism policy.

Conferences and shows designed specifically for travelers with disabilities are not uncommon. Australia, Brazil, Japan, and Mexico have all held national events. Brazil, Germany, Greece, Taiwan, Thailand, and the UK have all sponsored international conferences on accessible tourism or will do so by the end of 2005.

The October 7-8 “Accessible Holiday Show” to be held at Stoke Mandeville Stadium in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire will be the first national event of its type promoting tourism for all in the UK. The December 12-14, 2005 “Universal Access in Travel: Symposium and Exposition” scheduled for the Marriott Baltimore Waterfront Hotel will be the first such event reaching a national audience in the US.

The trend is not surprising.

The Open Doors Organization reports that people with disabilities in the United States have increased the number of their hotel stays by 50% according to the results of their 2005 Harris Interactive study of the travel behavior and market potential of travelers with disabilities.

This up trend occurred while 60% of travelers with disabilities who paid for lodging encountered problems ranging from physical barriers to customer service issues. "Many of the most common complaints identified in the study, such as heavy doors and lack of knowledge among staff, could be easy and inexpensive to resolve," comments Eric Lipp, director of the Open Doors Organization.

One initiative to resolve some of the obstacles to travel for those with disabilities was developed by Jim Abrams, President & CEO of the California Hotel & Lodging Association.

The project, “We Welcome Service Animals,” provides training materials on the rights of service animal users protected under the American with Disabilities Act. Educational literature, job site posters, and two videos, one developed for hotel and restaurant workers and a second for law enforcement officials are available. A third video is in production.

“We keep the industry up-to-date on best practices in tourism that can improve market share among those with mobility impairments and other disabilities,” reports Scott Rains, publisher of the Rolling Rains Report. “We have been growing the inclusive travel ecosystem and watching the adoption of the principles of Universal Design around the world.”

“This upsurge in regional, national, and international events for the industry,” continued Rains, “follows dissemination of quality studies on travel and disability such as Simon Darcy’s “From Anxiety to Access” and Eric’s studies of the US market. It also anticipates the diminished stamina and disablement of aging Boomers who will join the travel market.”

“Until this point, pioneers in the field have often treated supply chains for products targeting travelers with disabilities as proprietary. I think the industry has realized that there is enough demand to sustain standardization around Universal Design in infrastructure and more sophisticated partnerships among suppliers.”

Information on the “Accessible Holiday Show” in Aylesbury is available at http://www.accessibleholidayshow.co.uk/index.htm

Registration and an overview of the 2005 “Universal Access in Travel: Symposium and Exposition” in Baltimore are available at http://www.aaae.org/products/

Materials for “We Welcome Service Animals” is available at the California Hotel and Lodging Association web site http://www.calodging.com/products/service_animals.shtml


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The Rolling Rains Report (http://www.RollingRains.com ) and the Rolling Rains Newsletter (RollingrRainsNews-subscribe@topica.com) provide industry analysis and news.

Publisher, Dr. Scott Rains, is a ZeroDivide Fellow of the Community Technology Foundation of California and past Resident Scholar at the Center for Cultural Studies of the University of California, Santa Cruz. He also edits the Travel & Disability section of Suite 101.com (http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/18423 ); the Social Inclusion Forum at eTur ("Turismo e Inclusão Social" ; http://www.etur.com.br/index.asp) and contributes to Travel & Transitions (http://www.travelandtransitions.com/interviews/scott_rains.htm ) His most recent publication is as editor of the special edition of Review of Disability Studies dedicated to disability and tourism (in press.)
Contact: email - srains@oco.net
phone – 408.267.4751