[il-talk] Fw: Fwd: [Travelandtourism] Unlimiting access Here's an interesting article about the increasing numbers of travelers with disabilities

Tue Sep 11 23:08:47 UTC 2012

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Subject: Fwd: [Travelandtourism] Unlimiting access

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From: cheryl echevarria <cherylandmaxx at hotmail.com>
Date: Fri, Sep 7, 2012 at 3:58 PM
Subject: [Travelandtourism] Unlimiting access
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Good evening all:
Here is an awesome article from Travel Weekly about Accessible Travel.
By Kate RiceAccessible travel is about more than getting your grandmother and her mobility scooter onboard a cruise ship. Travelers with disabilities make up a significant market fueled by substantial discretionary income and a healthy appetite for travel.
And the market is growing.
Baby boomers are getting old -- reluctantly, perhaps, but inevitably. And they are definitely not growing old passively. While disabilities often accompany old age, this is a group that is not going sit on its hands and rock its way contentedly through its final decades. Boomers are going to go skydiving if they can. And travel suppliers are doing everything they can to make sure the disabled can realize their travel dreams just like anyone else.
According to a U.S. Census Bureau study, in 2005 more than 54 million U.S. residents reported having some form of disability. And this group wielded more than $220 billion a year in discretionary income, according to Andrew Garnett, president and CEO of the Special Needs Group, which specializes in providing travel equipment to the disabled.
Each year, travelers with disabilities spend an estimated $13.6 billion on travel and take 31.7 million trips. Moreover, they're not solo travelers: 85% travel with at least one companion, and they are often part of a larger group.
"It's not just them, but their families and friends, too," Garnett said. "In a [survey] from 1998, 24 million people with disabilities said they would travel more often if their needs were better met."
Looking at it from another point of view, one in five families in the U.S. has a family member who is disabled.
What's more, said Roberta Schwartz, a Cruise Planners franchise owner and former director of education for the Society for Accessible Travel and Hospitality (http://www.sath.org/), multigenerational travel is increasing, and often it's the grandparents who are footing the bill. Grandma might need oxygen, and grandpa might need a wheelchair.
As baby boomers age, they are dealing with disabilities that come with growing old. But this is a generation that will not let the ravages of age keep them at home because they grew up believing that travel is a right, not a luxury.
Kristy Lacroix, owner of Wheelchair Escapes, said that even though many boomers are apt to become disabled, "boomers are not going to stay home."
Schwartz agreed.
"The boomer market is not what the senior market was 20 years ago," she said. "Twenty years ago, if you were 65, you were old. Now if you're 65, you're jumping out of airplanes. Demographics alone means that the disabled market is increasing; the older you get, the greater your likelihood of developing a disability."
Schwartz, author of the Travel Institute's Accessible Travel Lifestyle Specialist course, described the disabled as a large and varied population, and it's by no means all baby boomers, nor are all disabilities a result of aging or illness. For example, Schwartz said, there are a large number of young people who were injured while serving in the military or in a driving or work-related accident.
Nor is disability always a matter of mobility issues. It also applies to those with full or partial loss of vision or hearing. In fact, Schwartz said, the biggest single group of disabled -- about 27 million Americans -- are those who have suffered a hearing loss, and only 20% of those who need hearing aids actually use them.
The second-largest segment of the disabled market, Schwartz said, are those with limited vision -- either seriously impaired sight or nearly complete vision loss.
Nor are disabilities always visible. The disabled might have diabetes or heart disease, which limits their ability to take part in many basic activities of life. Some agents specialize in working with families with autistic children.
Because mobility impairments are the most observable, the image of a wheelchair silhouette has become the international icon signaling that a room or site is accessible. But people who use wheelchairs actually remain a minority of people with impaired mobility; most in this group use a cane or walker or nothing at all.
It's been 22 years since President George H. W. Bush signed the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which, among other things, required businesses to make their services accessible to the disabled. Since then, Schwartz said, the U.S. has made huge strides, but talk to anyone who specializes in accessible travel and they will tell you that major challenges remain, even when traveling in the U.S.
A classic example is hotel bathrooms that are equipped with a rolling shower seat. Once in the shower, you can't reach the faucets, said Debra Kerper, owner of Easy Access Travel and an amputee who has found herself in a tub with faucets out of her reach.
Beyond that, the ADA applies only in the U.S. To specialize in accessible travel, an agent has to know how to help the disabled navigate a non-ADA-compliant world.
Schwartz said many agents think that accessible travel isn't for them, making it a part of the industry that has to deal with attitudinal barriers for its practitioners as well as physical barriers for the disabled. As SATH's director of education, she spent 10 years conducting seminars at travel agency meetings. She recalled frequently running into one agent who insisted she had no interest in the accessible-travel market. Then, at one meeting the woman suddenly made a beeline for her. She'd undergone an epiphany after breaking her leg.
Lacroix said that most agents probably have existing clients with a disabled friend or relative with whom they would like to travel. She tends to book small groups, has several traveling right now, and said that in the groups that include disabled travelers (she also books travel for the fully mobile), just one or two people are using wheelchairs or mobility scooters.
In fact, an agent's current clients might be aging into the disabled market. The Special Needs Travel Group has a questionnaire on its website for agents to use to monitor such clients.
Garnett said, "Travel agents may have clients they've worked with for years, and perhaps the customers didn't enjoy the last trip as much because they didn't enjoy getting around the way they used to."
Planning a trip with their needs in mind can bring the joy of travel back to them, she said. That can amount to something as simple as renting equipment that makes it easier for the client to get around. Or it can mean making sure that a client who loves to go to the casino on a cruise ship is booked into a cabin near the elevator bank that is closest to the casino.
When disabled travelers are going to go on a tour, Garnett said, they need to know what to expect. Big tour buses can accommodate wheelchairs and mobility scooters in their spacious baggage compartments so people can get out and sightsee. However, there's always that inevitable 10-minute photo stop in which the driver won't have time to get out that wheelchair or scooter; travelers and their agents should know in advance if there are going to be many of those. If so, that might not be the right tour.
Garnett acknowledged that some people whose disabilities are the byproduct of age are reluctant to try a mobility scooter. But he's had some families rent them even though their elderly relative said he or she wouldn't use one. Simply having one available is often all it takes after a day or two.
"If they have trouble getting around, they end up using it," he said. What he doesn't like are the calls he gets after a ship has sailed. These are the people who say, "I had no idea how large this ship is. Can you bring a scooter around?"
Group travel is a part of the disabled market, as well. Support groups and foundations for those with disabilities that result from diseases such as multiple sclerosis schedule group travel that's part vacation, part learning.
A group of 100 might include some MS patients who use wheelchairs and others who are mobile, along with their completely mobile family, friends and companions. Such groups might hold meetings with speakers talking about the latest trends and developments in dealing with the disease.
In short, there are as many reasons for embracing a special-needs expertise as there are clients. It's just a matter of when in an agent's relationship with any given client those special needs will manifest themselves.

Leading the Way in Independent Travel!
SNG Certified - Accessible Travel Advocate!
Cheryl Echevarria, Ownerhttp://www.echevarriatravel.com631-456-5394reservations@echevarriatravel.comhttp://http://www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com/
2012 Norwegian Cruise Line University Advisory Board Member.
Help fuel the "Dream Machine" of the Imagination Fund by visiting www.nfb.org/imaginationfund to make a donation using your credit card ortext the word "blind" to 85944 and you will automatically donate $10 worth of fuel via your cell phone bill.

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