One of the biggest challenges for disabled travelers is finding accessible hotel accommodations and public spaces, like restaurants, stores, and tourist sites that meet our special needs. While the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) provides many guidelines for public accommodations with regards to handicap accessibility, it does not (and cannot) place business managers, architects, and designers in the shoes of those who patronize their spaces. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
For example, a hotel room may meet all ADA legal guidelines but still be inconvenient at best or impossible at worst for a disabled guest to use. The biggest example of this is the new trend of placing very high platform beds in hotel rooms. Most hotel chains do not use lower or adjustable beds in accessible rooms. As such, it is impossible for many disabled travelers (such as myself) to get into an elevated bed without assistance, which is difficult at best if they are traveling alone. There is also no ADA requirement to ensure there is enough space around a bed for a person in a wheelchair to access and enter\/exit a bed comfortably. I have also seen accessible bathrooms in restaurants that have soap and paper towel dispensers placed so high that it requires a wheelchair user to stand up (if that\u2019s even possible) to reach them\u2014all while water is running up their arms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n