New Website Reveals Disabled Access Reviews
The launch of a new website that promises to offer honest reviews on the disabled access available at places throughout the UK is set to take off in popularity this month.
Perhaps unbelievably, despite the fact that around 11 million people in the UK have some form of disability, finding out how easily a venue is accessed by someone in a wheelchair is harder than you think. Many places happily post a disabled badge icon on their website or marketing materials, and don’t think beyond that to providing further information to any potential visitors. We have heard of people turning up somewhere, such as to a hotel, confident that disabled access is provided only to be met with a flight of stairs and no alternative mode of navigating them!
The aim of this site, named Euan’s Guide by the person who started it (http://www.euansguide.com/) is therefore available to encourage people to come and share their experiences of various places around the country, be it pubs, shops or tourist attractions, so that others can know what to expect before they make a trip somewhere.
They want to hear about how easily you found it to access a public place in a wheelchair, what the difficulties were and what you might hope to see adjusted in the future. If you found a problem, share it and likewise if you had no difficulties at all and would recommend it to other people, then say that too. Once they have a bank of these reviews, people will be able to quickly discover whether somewhere they are planning a trip to is going to pose a problem, before they arrive there. It will also give people an opportunity to take steps to remedy this where possible or find somewhere new to visit if it isn’t.
Endorsed by Professor Stephen Hawking, the people behind the site want to eliminate the fear you might feel when visiting somewhere new, of not knowing exactly what you can expect and the problems you might run into whilst there. This is why they are encouraging anyone who joins the site to always post an honest review, so that everyone can share in your experience and others won’t have to come across the same problems you did. In this way, the site is able to form a community which enables and assists others when it comes to visiting locations around the country.
Beyond this, venues will have the opportunity to advertise their accessibility, and users will be able to provide genuine responses on how accurate the venues are being. This will hopefully also provide useful and constructive feedback to the venues themselves on steps they may need to take in order to truly make their venue as accessible to visitors as possible.
The more people who visit the site and contribute, the more successfully people will be able to research and learn about potential places to visit.