By Jake Steinman

A 2017 poll at a travel trade show revealed that 75% of industry professionals associate accessibility primarily with wheelchairs. However, accessibility is far more complex—it’s like a race without a finish line, yet one with many starting lines.

Starting Points

The following are the starting points leaders in inclusion in the travel industry have chosen. What will your starting point be?

Sensory/Autism Tourism
Acceptance is the primary challenge for autistic families. A 2022 IBCCES survey found that 87% of these families avoid travel due to embarrassment, yet 93% would travel if hotels and travel suppliers were more welcoming. Training consumer-facing staff to foster awareness and acceptance is crucial.

• Julie Pingston, CEO of Choose Lansing, made a local theater sensory-friendly for families with autistic children, leading to broader training initiatives across attractions and hotels.
• Visit Mesa became the first autism certified city where IBCCES, a credentialing agency that provides autism certification training, was able to train over 60 percent of not only travel partners, but city government, first responders, and the police and police departments. 

Blind and Low Vision Tourism
Navigation poses significant challenges for individuals with visual impairments, ranging from complete blindness to low vision issues.

• Richard Gray, Sr. Vice President of Inclusion and Accessibility at Visit Lauderdale, created a promotional video featuring “Blind Bill,” a local resident navigating the waterfront.
• Visit Seattle launched a campaign to counter negative publicity by offering Enchroma color-blind sunglasses for loan at the Chihuly Garden and Glass Museum.

Deaf and Hard of Hearing Tourism
Communication is the main challenge for the Deaf and hard of hearing community. Innovative technologies, such as hearing loops and apps for on-demand sign language interpreters, are emerging. At TravelAbility, we will showcase assistive devices, including avatar-based interpreters and remote interpreting via mobile apps. 

• Visit Lauderdale successfully hosted the Deaf Seniors Annual Convention, generating over 2,000 room nights and positive endorsements for future disability conventions.
• Travel Oregon has installed hearing loops—which amplify sound for the partially deaf or hard of hearing through hearing aids and cochlear implants.

Mobility Tourism
Mobility challenges vary widely, from individuals temporarily disabled after surgery to those in power wheelchairs needing assistance. While many locations comply with the ADA, the law was designed for the median user, leaving some travelers uncertain about accessibility until they arrive.

• Visit Charlottesville and Albemarle County initiated an accessibility audit funded by a $30,000 grant, allowing Wheel the World, an accessible travel booking engine, to audit accessibility features across nearly 100 hotels, attractions, and restaurants.

Rachel Kamen, Public Affairs Specialist for Waymo, shares how Waymo’s mission pairs perfectly with TravelAbility’s drive for inclusion.

Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company with a mission to make it safe and easy for people and things to get where they’re going. Since our start as the Google Self-Driving Car Project in 2009, Waymo has been focused on building, deploying, and commercializing the World’s Most Experienced Driver™ technology to improve the world’s access to mobility while saving thousands of lives now lost to traffic crashes. 

The Waymo Driver powers Waymo One, the world’s first fully autonomous ride-hailing service, which is available in Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles and soon – Austin. To date, Waymo has autonomously driven tens of millions of miles on public roads and tens of billions of miles in simulation, across 13+ U.S. states.

Waymo recognizes the transformative impact AVs can have, allowing individuals with disabilities to travel with ease, access essential services, and participate more fully in society, thereby breaking down barriers and fostering a more inclusive future for all. 

We believe that autonomous driving technology holds the promise to address many of the mobility challenges that the disability community has faced, and we’re committed to listening to and working with this community to build features that support improved mobility for all. 

We’ve partnered with key organizations that represent a variety of groups affected by lack of mobility options to ensure our product is meeting the needs of potential riders, while helping us identify gaps in our service; this includes working with organizations such as National Federation of the Blind, United Cerebral Palsy, United Spinal Association, and many more organizations that can help inform additional accessibility needs and features as we move forward as a company and transportation service provider. Waymo gains critical insights into specific accessibility needs and considerations through the Waymo Accessibility Network, ongoing rider feedback and user experience research (UXR) studies. 

Our ride-hailing app, Waymo One, supports accessibility features including screen readers, while also providing educational riding tips so riders know what to expect before entering the vehicle (how to board, where to sit, and how to control their ride). Riders who are deaf are able to contact our rider support team with a chat feature instead of a voice call. For riders who are blind or low vision, we developed inclusive wayfinding features such as being able to honk the car’s horn to easily find the vehicle at pickup, in addition to various audio cues throughout the in-car experience that help riders start the ride and describe key events along the way such as if the vehicle is changing lanes or stopping to yield to pedestrians. Our Rider Support agents are also trained to effectively and respectfully respond to riders who have various accessibility needs.

Waymo has been a steadfast partner to the disability community since its inception. Through ongoing collaboration, we have witnessed firsthand how Waymo’s autonomous driving technology has empowered individuals with disabilities, granting them enhanced mobility and newfound independence through autonomous driving solutions.

We believe Waymo’s mission is innately aligned with TravelAbility’s essential work in cultivating inclusive travel experiences. As an autonomous ride-hailing company, we feel that Waymo is a key resource for travelers who live with disabilities, offering a safe and accessible way to travel and explore independently. 

Continuing to evolve our accessibility features is a foundational part of how we think about our product.  As we continue to expand our service territories and open up service in new markets, we’ll continue to do so thoughtfully and incrementally to provide the safest, most thoughtful service to our riders so more people can enjoy the benefits of autonomous ride-hailing, including when they travel to new places!