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The Intersection of Travel and Disability

Accessibility Awards

TravelAbility Announces Winners of InnovateAble Pitchfest for Assistive Technology

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TravelAbility, an organization working to improve the travel experience for people with disabilities, has announced the winners of its InnovateAble Pitchfest, a virtual event that showcased the latest assistive technology and innovations for travelers with disabilities. The event took place on July 26, 2023, to celebrate the 33rd anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

The InnovateAble Pitchfest featured presentations from 10 companies and startups that have developed cutting-edge products and services that can make travel easier and more enjoyable for people with different abilities. The presentations were judged by a panel of experts from the tourism industry, the investor community, and the CES pitchfest recruiter, as well as by the attendees who voted for the People’s Choice Award.

The overall winner of the InnovateAble Pitchfest was Enchroma, a company that makes specially engineered glasses and scenic viewers that enable people who are color blind to see colors. The glasses and viewer telescopes are offered to the public by over 200 organizations including 80 museums, 40 state and national parks in 18 states, and many other tourist destinations.

The first runner-up was Translate Live ILA, a device that allows hotels and attractions to provide close captioning, language translation, and ASL sign language assistance on demand. The second runner-up was Spoke, an app that alerts people who are deaf or hard of hearing to important public announcements in airports and other locales.

The People’s Choice Award went to Centaur Robotics, a revolutionary electric vehicle that elevates and fits into the space of a dining room chair to navigate narrow rooms spaces.

Other companies selected for InnovateAble included:

Dateability, The only dating app designed for the disabled and chronically ill communities.

Vacayit, Explore and experience sensory and audio described tours in 160 Australian locations

Lisnen, App that notifies the deaf or HOH to phone rings, door knocks and alarms that can save their life

Be My Eyes, An app that uses ChatGTP4 to help blind users navigate a hotel or attractions

Purple Lens, A digital accessibility toolkit that combines automated and human remediation

Picture Live, A photobook that enables audio descriptions or ASL interpreters via a QR code.

For more information about TravelAbility and InnovateAble Pitchfest, contact Jake Steinman at jake@travelability.net.

To access all Innovateable presentations: click here.

About the TravelAbility Portfolio of projects: 

EMERGING MARKETS SUMMIT is a boutique conference covering the growing niches of accessibility, sustainability and DE&I

TRAVELABILITY INSIDER, is an online newsletter with 3300 subscribers

TRAVELABILITY FOR HOSPITALITY is a quarterly newsletter for the hotel industry

DESTINATIONS WITH ACCESSIBILITY  is a micro-site that aggregates accessibility content for 143 destinations in the US, Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean, THE ACCESSIBILITY PLAYBOOK is a 38-page resource containing videos, slide decks, technology, products, tips and use case scenarios designed to help any travel organization/company advance their accessibility

THE DESTINATION A11Y CLUB,is a collection of DMO’s committed to advancing accessibility together. INNOVATEABLE, is an annual showcase of adaptive innovations, technologies, services and amenities that can be introduced through the travel channel 

Our YOUTUBE CHANNEL archives contain over 100 video sessions from prior conferences and events. TRAVELABILITY FOUNDATION is a 501 (c) (3) non-profit corporation with the mission to work with travel industry suppliers to make travel more accessible for people with disabilities

Michigan Group Tour Guide on a Mission to Include Everyone

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Grand Rapid’s Tours Around Michigan Founder has received accolades for adapting her tours to all kinds of travellers.

Tourism was a passion that married Candice Smith’s love of storytelling with her high level of customer experience. Her experience working with spoken language interpreters made it an easy transition to working with sign-language interpreters too. This work quickly resulted in her receiving Certified Tourism Ambassador (CTA) Of the Year for Kent County, MI and a WAVE Award for Best Attraction. Read More.

Our Takeaway: Group tour operators everywhere are trying to accommodate aging clients, several of whom are couples with a spouse with a disability.  This operator may have found one approach.  Look for the trend of bus operators to remove seats to make room for wheelchairs and retrofit coach entries with ramps.

14 Winners of Accessible Innovation Awards at CEO 2023 in Las Vegas.

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photo of #CES 2024 sculpture

A helpful toilet lifter, stabilizing smart makeup applicator, wearable navigation system for visually impaired individuals, and self-driving powerchair service have all been recognized at the prestigious CES 2023 Innovation Awards.

Taking place annually, the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is one of the largest global stages for companies to showcase their latest and greatest technology innovations. The show covers a wide variety of sectors including automotive, robotics, gaming, wearables, sports technology, and accessibility. CES is organized by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA).

AT Today has rounded up all 14 Honorees and Best of Innovation award winners in the accessibility category at the CES 2023 Innovation Awards. See the list here.

TravelAbility Advisory Board Members In the News:

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John Morris Meets the Pope

Photo of John Morris in wheelchair wearing a blue ski jacket shaking hands with the Pope who is in a wheelchair and dressed in a white cassock

Blessings to John Morris, founder of Wheelchairtravel.org, who paid a visit to Vatican City in Rome this past November that included a face-to-face audience with Pope Francis, a fellow wheelchair user. Learn How He Did it

Wheel the World Recognized By Fast Company

Photo of Camilo Navarro with beard wearing black fleece jacket

Kudos to Wheel the World co-founder and advisory board member Camilo Navarro on being selected as one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Travel Companies of 2022 as well as being invited to make a presentation from the main stage at CES in Las Vegas.

Goodmaps Wins CTA Pitch Competition

Headshot of Mike May wearing blue collared polo shirt

Hats off to Advisory Board member Mike May, chief evangelist, Goodmaps, which won the 2023 Consumer Technology Association (CTA) pitch competition at the 2023 CES in Las Vegas.

Josh Loebner in Adweek

photo of Josh Loebner in glasses wearing white shirt, purple cross hatched tie and a vest

Cheers to Advisory Board member, Josh Loebner, PhD, Global Director of Accessibility, Wunderman Thompson, who reviewed Seven of the most Accessible Brand campaigns and Actions of 2022 in an interview with Adweek.

The Envelope Please: One Family’s Accessible Travel Awards

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While there are always so many barriers in wheelchair travel, Jennifer Allen from Wonders within Reach loves to celebrate the places that are doing it right! These are the best accessible finds she has discovered over the past year; each would make great travel destinations for 2023. Some may even surprise you. Read more.