TravelAbility Insider

The Intersection of Travel and Disability

John Morris

ADA Shield Launches New Website Overlay Product for Hotels and Restaurants

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Female wheelchair users surfing the web on a computer.

ADA Shield, an INNsight company, has debuted a new accessibility overlay for websites in the hotel and restaurant industries that promises to help businesses achieve compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act and Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.

The company says that “INNsight was built from the ground-up on a proprietary Software-as-a-Service framework fine-tuned for hospitality businesses.” It boasts an “ADA Tray” plugin with tools to make websites “more perceivable, operable, comprehensible, and robust.”

The product retails for between $19.99-$159.00 per month, making it one of the most affordable accessibility overlay products. For more information, visit the ADA Shield website.

Eagle Mount Billings, an Adaptive Recreation Non-profit, Awarded Grant for New Equipment

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Eagle Mount, the non-profit organization that provides adaptive recreation opportunities for disabled children and adults, recently celebrated the delivery of new adaptive equipment purchased using a $25,000 grant from The Hartford insurance company.

Young girl in an athletic sports wheelchair.

The organization, located in Billings, Montana, has 11 adaptive recreation programs including cycling, climbing, golf, soccer, and swimming.

Emily Bailey, an Americorps VISTA spokesperson,  said that Eagle Mount focuses “on the things that people with disabilities can do, rather than what they can’t do.” 11-year-old Arabelle Laedusaw, who has participated in the organization’s events since she was three, said that “being with Eagle Mount makes me feel like I can do anything and achieve anything. I can do what I want to do as a person, even though I have a disability.”

To read more about the great work done at Eagle Mount Billings, check out this local news story.

New Lease on Color: Denver Art Museum Brings Color to Life for Colorblind Visitors

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Two men looking at art in a museum while wearing glasses that correct colorblindness.
Photo courtesy Museum of Contemporary Art Denver.

Denver’s Museum of Contemporary Art has debuted a new accessibility feature – EnChroma glasses – that bring the vibrant colors of paintings and other art exhibits to life for colorblind people.

EnChroma glasses, specially engineered for people with a color vision deficiency, compensate for colorblindness and reveal colors that the wearer has never seen before. The museum received four pairs of the glasses, which retail for between $269 and $429, as a donation from the manufacturer.

Brad Ingles, the museum’s memberships and community partnerships manager, raised the idea. In speaking about his own experiences with colorblindness in art museums, Ingles reflected that “Every single person was experiencing what the artist was talking about, except for me.” Now, with the EnChroma glasses, he and museum visitors can experience artwork as the artist intended.

OUR TAKE: EnChroma glasses are an exciting new accessibility tool that can bring a wider range of colors to colorblind people, and art museums are the perfect place to debut. As more museums make EnChroma glasses available to museum goers, travelers can look forward to more vibrant and colorful experiences!

To read more about this exciting development, read the full article in Hyperallergic.

Hands Down! 14 Beauty Products for People Who Can Only Use One Hand

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Makeup and cosmetics on a table.

After a car accident that left her left arm paralyzed, Chloe Toscano began searching for beauty products that would make it easier for people like her who have the use of only one hand. She recently published a list of 14 such products in Allure, which she says “get an A in the accessible-design department.”

One of the products Chloe highlighted is the Tiy Pro Customizable Elastic Hair Tie, which allows her to easily put her hair in a bun or in a ponytail with one hand. She wrote, “Relearning how to tie my hair with one arm was my biggest beauty challenge after my accident. When I finally got it, I realized I could only do it with ties that were already stretched out. But Tiy has created the first customizable hair tie, so no matter what size, length, or tension works best for you, you can have it.”

The ease of use of this and the other accessible products she’s identified extends to every user – not just those with disabilities. Beauty should be accessible to all, and the innovation in the industry is bringing it to more people each day.

To check out Chloe’s full list of 14 accessible beauty products, see her article in Allure.

Spain to Train Personal Care Assistants for Disabled Tourists

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Barcelona, Spain skyline.

One of the biggest costs many disabled people face when traveling is hiring a personal care assistant – professionals who help with transfers in and out of bed, taking a bath, getting dressed, etc. In an effort to attract more disabled tourists, Spain is seeking to lower the cost of these services through a unique training program.

As reported by Disway, Spain’s State Representative Platform of People with Physical and Organic Disabilities (Predif) is “launching an online course that, financed by the Secretary of State for Tourism, will train professionals in the travel sector to specialize as personal assistants of tourists with accessibility needs.”

The 50-hour training course will be offered from July 14-19 and is targeted for people in the cities of Madrid, Valladolid and Palma de Mallorca.

To learn more about this unique program, see the article in Disway.