TravelAbility Insider

The Intersection of Travel and Disability

Expert Q&A

Who Is Wheelchair Jimmy and Why Should We Care?

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If you don’t already know ‘Wheelchair Jimmy’, you’re missing out on a treasure trove of information. This month, TravelAbilityInsider.com got a chance to catch up with the man behind the site, Jim Parsons, to talk about his accessibility reviews. There are more than 4,000 reviews in the site of accessible hotels, attractions, destinations—and just about any damn thing he feels like reviewing. He’s developed a credible rating system with the help of other disabled travelers to let folks know where to go and what to avoid. Since he retired, he’s been sharing his wheelchair travel insights through his website/online guide WheelchairJimmy.com.  


Q: When and what prompted you to create Wheelchair Jimmy?

A: At the age of 20, I became paralyzed in an accident and began using a wheelchair for mobility.  After the accident, I finished up my MBA at Indiana University and began a career in banking that required extensive travel. Well before the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), I had to learn  to navigate hotels, restaurants, airlines, from my wheelchair.

Q: How many destinations and reviews do you have on the site?

A: Five continents and 40+ countries in 50 years. 

Q: What is the purpose of your website and how many followers have signed up?

A: My travels over the past 50 years have taken me to so many places around the world—some great, some horrible. There are always challenges involved when traveling in a wheelchair. When I retired, I decided to create the site, WheelchairJimmy.com. I wanted to put together a site to review and rate hotels, restaurants, attractions, and transportation.  My purpose is to let people know what’s accessible and, more importantly, what to avoid. With that in mind, I created the Wheelchair Jimmy Accessibility Rating (WJAR) system.

Q: How does the WJAR Rating System work?

A: Indiana University has an accessibility program, so I asked one of the professors there to work with me to create the WJAR system. As we were building it out, hospitality Professor Cynthia Mehia at the University of Central Florida Hospitality (UCFH) program helped us create a database for the students. As they visited various properties, they collected accessibility information along with videos and photos. I then went in and analyzed the data and decided on a WJAR score for each venue. With the UCFH program, we’ve now covered all of Orlando and much more. I’ve also received calls from other hospitality programs wanting to get involved, so we’re working on bringing them on as well. They’re learning that it’s not just about ADA compliance it’s also about customer service and training. Some of the students rented wheelchairs to do their reviews. Through these programs, we’ve added over 200 entries to the database including hotels, restaurants, casinos, transportation, and attractions.

Q: What recommendations do you have for wheelchair users?

A: Never book anything online or even with the call centers for a hotel chain. When you reserve with a call center, they take down the booking information and then send the instructions to the specific property. However, sometimes the pertinent details aren’t properly relayed, so you end up arriving at your hotel and discover they didn’t reserve you an accessible room. I always reserve with the front desk of the specific property I’m going to stay at. I also have a list of 20 questions I ask them about accessibility.

Q: How many listings do you have on the site now? 

A: Currently, we have over 4,000 listings of hotels, restaurants, attractions, transportation companies, cruise lines and destinations.  Our YouTube channel has 400 video reviews. A total of 70 were done by hospitality program students from UN Las Vegas, and Rosen School of Hospitality at the University of Central Florida. 

Q: When people with a disability will be feel comfortable traveling again? 

A:  I’m carefully watching Las Vegas resorts and cruise lines. They operate as self- contained cities that have been catering, in varying degrees, to travelers with a disability. Las Vegas is opening in June. Carnival Cruise lines are taking reservations for August departures. From what I’ve seen, if the standards and practices they have been communicating work to create both a high safety level and a positive guest experience, they will be able to attract some people. That said, I don’t think the disability community will be traveling again until there’s a vaccine or pharmaceutical treatment that’s safe and widely available.

Q: Have you traveled since sheltering lockdowns were in place? 

A: We drove from Phoenix (where I spent the winter) back home to Washington State and spent two nights in hotels. I could see how sensitive they were to touchpoints, physical distancing, and food and beverage. Room service arrived in bags left outside our hotel room door.  

Listening Tour Notes From our Founder: “Oakland Speaks Its Mind and We Listen to Their Awesome Questions”

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TravelAbility 2020 listening tour
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As Listening Tours tend to do, our recent Oakland roundtable raised some smart questions and pushed us to think about accessibility, tech, disability and the travel industry in even deeper ways. It also motivated many of our colleagues to take the fear of compliance and turn it into action. Here are a few of the items of interest during our Oakland, CA, meeting.

  1. Pam Wright of Point Hospitality told the group about using the AccessiBE app to make all six of their hotel websites compliant. The motivation for this action was to deter lawsuits.  Point Hospitality will work with TravelAbility to design an “Accessible FAQ” page on their website as a model that can be used by others that will include accessible room specs as well as images.
  2. Astrid Johannessen of Alcatraz Cruises told the group about the new Bay cruise initiative with the National Park Service (NPS) that will feature a full range of accessibility options including audio description and assistive hearing devices. NPS holds an annual training session at Fort Mason. One of the desired outcomes is to get front line staff to be more pro-active.
  3. Jake Steinman, Founder, TravelAbility Summit brought the group up to speed on some of the industry news that will be impacting the next TravelAbility Summit. On the table: Expedia is expanding their Diversity & Inclusion program beyond its internal employee focus to an external effort that includes customers. 
  4. The concept of shared values seems to be trending in destination marketing. Many are working to understand the needs of their communities and providing accessibility solutions locally. The Think Differently Pledge in Dutchess County took this approach and has over 60 different municipalities who signed their pledge and committed to making their communities inclusive for all. TravelAbility is working on a sample pledge that DMO’s can use with their hotel and attraction partners.
  5. Toby Willis from Expedia recently joined the TravelAbility Advisory Board and there may be opportunities to collaborate with them on scenario-based training videos.
  6. Art Jimenez is positioning the Reno Sparks CVB as the driving force behind accessibility and working with a group in Truckee –Hi5’s – an organization of adaptive sports athletes. The CVB will be highlighting individual athletes in their social media campaigns.

Thanks to all who attended including Astrid Johannessen, Alcatraz Cruises; Bonnie Lewkowicz, BORP; Pam Wright, Point Hospitality; Laszlo Horvath, Active Media; Elaine Schroth, Visit Concord; Jake Steinman, Tricia Roth,  TravelAbility Summit; Art Jimenez, Reno-Tahoe: Tracy Harris, Reno Tahoe

Could Keroul Be the Model for the Accessible DMO of the Future?

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left to right: Isabelle Ducharme, Jake Steinman, founder of TravelAbility Summit with Andre Leclerc of Keroul

by Jake Steinman

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to meet the founders and president of Keroul (translated loosely in French: Quebec Rolls), perhaps the world’s most innovative destination centric organization advocating for disabled travelers, in their offices in Montreal’s historic Olympic stadium. The organization, and its founder, Andre Leclerc, are about to celebrate their 40th anniversary.  Here, a look back and what we can all learn from their endeavor, how they work and a brief Q&A:

Andre Leclerc, who was born with cerebral palsy, founded Keroul after he was picked up hitchhiking to meet his girlfriend. He had been living in a facility for people with disabilities—and the police believed he had “escaped.” It was then that Leclerc recognized the need for an organization that would fight for the rights of people with disabilities and decided to focus on travel and leisure activities.  He would be up against some big challenges. In the 1970s,  there were many transportation issues for the disabled.  While on a trip that included able-bodied members of the group, he realized a sensitivity about people with disabilities that made some of his trip mates uncomfortable. This year LeClerc turns 65 and will retire. Isabelle Ducharme, president of the Keroul Organization, who has worked with Leclerc on day-to-day operations for the past decade will lead. 

We believe Keroul has created a business model that can partially be replicated by many state and regional organizations in the U.S. as baby boomers begin aging into a disability will need a trusted neutral source such as DMO’s.  We took a look at the stunning legacy LeClerc will leave his team and Quebec and are pleased to have the chance to pass along their wisdom. 

Gaining Prestige (and $5 Million Dollars)  The process of acquiring grant funding is not always simple, but it has been successful for the Keroul organization. Today, Keroul is funded by grants from the province of Quebec and Federal entities, private donations, and fundraisers.  By providing persistent advocacy and positive ideas, they gained media attention and political clout. When, years ago, the minister of tourism entrusted Keroul with $5 million in grant funding to disburse over five years to tourism establishments, they planted the seeds for Quebec to become more accessible for locals and tourists. Today Ducharme oversees grants in which Keroul finances up to 80% of the grant, with a limit of $50,000. 

Keroul Is An Accessibility Information Hub  Today the Keroul website has become the epicenter of accessible travel for the province of Quebec. In addition to the funding, Keroul provides a variety of other services for travel suppliers such as accessibility assessment, consulting, and training which can generate additional funds.  Keroul maintains a staff of 10 people full time, several of which perform on-site evaluations of hotels, attractions, and museums after which they receive a designation as accessible, partially accessible or not accessible.   There are 84 accessible hotel properties in the Quebec City area. For information about venues in the province of Quebec, visit www.quebecforall.com/en

A Brief Q&A with Mr. LeClerc and Ms. Ducharme

Q:Can you give us an example of one of the companies that received a Keroul grant? 

Leclerc: Yes, one recently went to an apple picking tour operator who added a lift that would make his tour tram fully accessible.  We provided 80% of the funding and they provided the rest.

Q: Where do you see disability travel five or 10 years from now?

Leclerc: We believe the movement to accessibility will accelerate; we already see it moving more rapidly, not only in the volume of requests for the grants—we’ve had 155 so far—but also by the interest in our services.  While we once had to convince travel enterprises to use our services, now, hotels, attractions, and suppliers are calling us because they want to be evaluated and promoted through our marketing efforts.  

Q: When you receive requests from travel suppliers (i.e. hotels, tours, attractions) to verify their level of accessibility, do you send your staff to verify that, or do you work with outside disability organizations to do this.  If this is internal, how many members of your staff perform this?  

Ducharme: We mostly send our staff. As we have some mandate with organizations across the province, there are often enough opportunities to send someone from Keroul, depending on if the company is willing to wait a few weeks. Otherwise, we also have a network of evaluators that can do the job as well, but only if it’s related to the assessment, as they are only trained to fill out forms for our database, not recommend modifications. Those external evaluators are mostly architects and professionals from the tourism industry. We are contemplating the idea of having people from other disability-related organizations.

Q: How many companies do you certify in an average year? 

Ducharme: We added or reassessed 131 establishments to our database this past year. Next year, we are confident that it will be even more, as two other employees recently joined our team. We are now up to four accessibility advisors, overseen by one manager. 

Keroul will also be overseeing the third edition of  Destinations for All, a worldwide conference covering accessible travel,  organized by Open Doors Organization, in Miami in 2021. Isabelle Ducharme will explain her business model and what other tourism organizations can adapt at TravelAbility Summit, November 12-13, 2019.  

Travelability Insider’s Exclusive Interviews with Disability Experts

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exlusive interviews photos of Nate and John Sage

OUR TAKE: When we rolled out TravelAbilityInsider, the companion to our upcoming Summit in November, we did a deep dive into what we didn’t know and found outstanding experts to help. Many have joined our diverse advisory board and made commitments to be at the TravelAbility Summit. Their subject expertise ranges from making a website accessible to creating an itinerary for all abilities. Find exclusive interviews here and get ready for more learning and fun on November 12-13 in San Francisco.

REGISTER HERE

The Designer Behind Brand USA’s Talking Website (That Promoted Outdoor America)…Talks to Us

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A quick look at how accessibility information is shown in captions.

You can tell there’s something different about Chris Lona’s website designs from the moment you open the site. They are simple, well-organized and engaging. One huge point of difference in his design is that he creates websites that can talk to you—but just saying that would be underselling his work. TravelAbility Insider got the chance to talk with him about the web design he has done for companies including Brand USA and the University of Massachusetts, creating cross-platform designs that everyone can use, including people with visual, hearing, mobility and cognitive challenges. “When Brand USA launched its Great Outdoors initiatives in 2016, the organization wanted to ensure it would be able to extend its invitation to the world to visit the USA with an inclusive and welcoming message. To accomplish that Brand USA worked with CL Design to design an accessible Outdoor USA subsection on its consumer website. This included “talking” (audio) instructions that would literally speak to people who have disabilities that might affect their ability to navigate information online,” said Anne Madison, former chief strategy & communications officer for Brand USA.

Many businesses have initiated re-designs because of changes made last December According to a story in the Los Angeles Times, the agency that governs ADA laws announced it was withdrawing its rulemaking process as the Trump administration was calling for a rollback of federal regulations. The consequences of the deregulation: a maelstrom of lawsuits on behalf of people with disabilities, many of whom are frustrated by businesses’ lack of compliance with ADA law. But how are businesses responding? Who is responsible for the 30% growth of the lawsuits in a single year? And how exactly does a business ensure its website is ADA compliant? Answering those questions can be time-consuming and costly.  Here’s what Chris Lona had to say: 

DB: How did you get interested in accessible web design?

CL: When I was a student, I started having double vision and was diagnosed with a brain tumor. Treatment was successful but left me with an autoimmune condition and long-term vision problems. I  was in the last year of a five-year architectural degree program and while my colleagues were gearing up to intern, I was undergoing spinal taps and radiation treatment. Instead of returning to architecture, I became interested in web design. I think of web design and accessibility as very similar to architecture—I find structural solutions and create beautiful products using universal design which is another way of saying design created with truly everyone in mind. Plus, having recently been through the whole tumor issue, I think, gave me a new perspective on accessibility. CL Design, my business based in Bellevue, Washington, focuses on inclusive web accessibility and strategic branding design.    

DB: What does inclusivity mean to you? Is it different than accessibility? Maybe you are hoping to achieve both.

CL: Inclusivity incorporates accessibility. And yes achieving both is one of many objectives. I call my designs the “curb cuts of the web” because one of the main objectives is to create a sort of invisible accessibility where people just use it because it works. Curb cuts were designed for people who use wheelchairs but are enjoyed by people on bikes, pushing strollers, using a hand truck, using crutches and so on. So, extrapolating that model to the web, I prefer to design and include better, accessible web experiences for everyone from the ground up instead of fixing the problem of compliance with web accessibility regulations and guidelines such as the ADA, Section 508, and WCAG as an afterthought to development. The websites I create accommodate people with visual, hearing, mobility and cognitive challenges. But of course, anyone can benefit from the choice of human audio narration, captions/text, one keypress (or touch) navigation and more effective communication that comes with the combination of audio, text, and images.

DB: Many businesses revising their websites to be ADA compliant are doing so begrudgingly, honestly, because it can be a costly time consuming and disruptive process. Travel destinations and suppliers have sites with hundreds of pages others are small businesses such as boutique hotels.  How do you simplify the process?

CL: My work is based around a simple philosophy—treat people like people and offer them the best experience possible. Ultimately, web design is about customer service. A website may be the first time that consumers (one in 5 of whom have a disability of some kind) come in contact with your business. It’s my belief that becoming as accessible as possible can align with ROI. That said, even making small changes can be much more than compliance. No one says an organization has to make their entire site accessible at one time; in fact, we often suggest pilot projects for a specific area that may be of a higher priority. Usually, I suggest the features of a destination itself.  It is an investment in future travelers who do much of their buying and travel research online. 

DB: How do you incorporate accessible designs into clients’ websites?

CL: Happy to explain it. Incorporating inclusive web accessibility (IWA)  into clients’ websites is designed to be virtually effortless. A simple graphic or icon is provided to the client. It may say something like “Experience Our Talking Website”. Their IT department or consultant can then show them how to place it into their existing site and link it to the web address we provide at sitellites.com—our special domain for inclusive web accessibility presentations. When a visitor clicks (or touches) the graphic/icon on the existing site, they are directed to our presentation.

If a client wishes to deploy our accessible site under their domain, we can provide all of the files required for them to do so. Simple updates like a change of address are often done as a courtesy. Since most DMOs and CVBs are not specialists in accessible web design, we are happy to make more extensive updates within their budget which frees them up to do what they do best. Training in how to make updates themselves is also possible. The results of adding IWA to an existing site removes barriers for the organization and for their customers. For organizations, the extra time and web infrastructure tacked on as an afterthought to their existing site for less-than-optimal accessibility is removed. And since no assistive technology is required for their customers to use IWA presentations, the barriers of acquiring, learning and using it is removed. It is an accessible experience for all.

DB: Without getting too technical, can you explain what Lona Design includes and how programmers use it? 

CL: Sure, here’s how I explain it to potential clients: Inclusive web accessibility isn’t intended to replace your existing design tools, but to augment it. Current design tools are extremely powerful when it comes to creating and iterating on new ideas. However, after new ideas have been designed, they need to be stress-tested on different screen sizes and with real data. They then need to be translated into UI code. This is where Lona shines. It is a single design system that encodes all of the data. The design system ensures cross-platform consistency (in other words, it works across web, iOS, and Android platforms). Other design files require manual translation into code for each different platform—this price is time-consuming and error-prone. 

DB: Where can people see examples of web accessibility. This may help businesses just beginning on this journey. 
CL: To learn more about inclusive web accessibility visit cldesign.co/iwa 
To see examples of my work, visit CL Design (cldesign.co).
See a recent project designed for the Blue Badge Access Awards at sitellites.com/bbaa. (The augmented site is bluebadgeaccessawards.com.)
A project related to our work with Brand USA is at www.accesstheusa.online. It features inclusive web accessibility presentations for all 50 states.

Chris Lona will be speaking at TravelAbility Summit and is available earlier if an attendee would like to reach out with suggestions, comments or questions. For more coverage of liability and ADA compliance, see our archived posts, which describes how the public has come to depend on websites to do everything from book a hotel room to update their flight plans and the effect of the rollback of federal regulations.