A love of Chicago and a desire to help people with disabilities blended together when I was asked to create a website for a graduate school project in 2005. The first version of my website offered detailed instructions to 5 major attractions within the Windy City for travelers with disabilities. I named it Accessible Chicago, and its mission was to end isolation for those with physical impairments by taking the guesswork out of visiting the Windy City. As the site began to grow, I began to understand how much traveling means to those with special needs. It is critically important for those who feel compromised by disability to go out and have fun. Of course it is harder for our community to get around, but the trip is more satisfying to us because we make it despite physical disability.
Accessible Chicago works on several levels. Most importantly, it provides detailed instructions on how to visit hotels, restaurants and tourist attractions in the Chicagoland area. Knowing where and how others with physical challenges or those in wheelchairs have made the trip before, empowers people with physical challenges to leave their houses and discover how beautiful Chicago, IL is. As a free on-line resource, Accessible Chicago creates a network of users who create their own content and share their experience. Now, other travelers with disabilities don’t have to “reinvent the wheel” every time they go to Chicago; they can just log on and see other users’ ideas and instructions for going to some of the top destinations in Chicago. With the new version of AC.org launched last month, users can enter their own experiences and tips on getting around Chicago. Users can email us questions, offer their own reviews of places they have traveled or take polls telling those in the business and educational communities what is important to them.
Third, Accessible Chicago seeks to reward businesses and attractions for making it easy for those with special needs to be their customers. “With 54 million people in the United States being limited in their activities by a long term disability” (See 1.), and as “the projected number of those 65 and older swells from 12.4 percent of the American population today to 18.2 percent in 2025”, (See 2.), the business community is finding out that helping those in wheelchairs and slow walkers get the most out of life is not just an ethical and moral imperative, but it makes great business sense as well. My dream is to have a site like Accessible Chicago for every major tourist destination in the world linked to one another. We invite you to log on, register and become a member of our growing community. Note: Since then, the Art Institute has built a ramp at its Michigan Ave. entrance.
- Solutions Marketing Group Study. http://disability-marketing.com/facts/
- Weisman, A Gimpse of Older America, Washington Post,
Sunday, May 22, 2005
