LET'S SET UP CONNECTIONS

Santiago Salgado Balbellido
Director de Polibea Turismo

When the subject of accessibility is raised, before wondering about what must be done, and how, when, where or how much it will cost, we should ask ourselves why it must be done.

There's much ignorance around disability and it is tackled wrongly by politicians, professionals and technicians: people qualified enough and with the social and political duty to do things properly. Many people are still loath to accept complete inclusion: people who would scream blue murder if an immigrant were not admitted, for instance, in a hotel or a museum, accept the existence of stairs or access barriers in these same places in a natural way.

There is the absurd idea, albeit expanded, that disabled people don't wish or cannot enjoy culture, leisure or tourism. There is no difference between being sat or standing when it comes to enjoy a monument or a landscape. It is also commonly thought that a blind person wouldn't wish to travel being unable to see the visited places and limited to sense the integral experience that travel implies. Of course, the journey will fail if a single one among the accessibility features needed is not provided.

We could say that someone who is on crutches is someone who cannot walk properly and everybody knows what that means. We could also say that someone in a wheelchair is someone who is sitting and we know how to look after someone who is sitting. If you close your eyes, you can understand the situation on which a blind person is, and if you stop up your ears, you will become aware of the problems that a deaf person may face, etc.. It is that simple. We just have to put ourselves in their places and proceed consequently.

When the subject of accessibility is raised, before wondering about what must be done, and how, when, where or how much it will cost, we should ask ourselves why it must be done. It's the answer to this question what will result either in success or failure; it is not so much a case about learning how to do things in a certain way, but understanding why they must be done. The opposite - attempting to learn without having understood - is just impossible, and that is why so many mistakes often happen when aiming at barriers removal, turning out to the maddening situation on which the action intended to favouring accessibility is the one creating the barrier.

Nowadays, we have laws guiding and compelling us to incorporate means of accessibility. We have a culture of integration. There are enough experiences of good pieces of work. There is enough technology and technical means to provide the most suitable solution in each case. Financial support, aids and subsidies are provided to eliminate barriers. We have books and professional projects to consult and learn from, but we are still far from having proper accessible conditions. It is necessary to understand in order to incorporate means of accessibility, not as something imposed, unknown or exceptional, but as a natural action which goes further on - as every piece of work should - including every citizen, it being the ultimate aim of any human task.

The disabled, with their personal effort and significant technical development are overcoming certain barriers that they come across when moving or communicating. They can move autonomously by means of electric wheelchairs thus overcoming their disability to move by themselves. Now gardens, buildings or sights must overcome their own disability to accept them, removing their barriers.

A story goes about an engineer who, when getting old and some ailments started to appear, was put in an old people's home. Being dissatisfied with the situation, he spent the whole day attracting the atterntion of the staff who looked after him ringing the bell. They had enough and decided to unplug the bell. Therefore, some time went by without him bothering them until one day the bell started to ring again. When they approached him, astonished, and asked him how the unplugged bell could ring again he answered: "Taking into account the attention I´m receiving I can't feel a person anymore, but I am still an engineer."

Disability does not quash professions, neither culture and the desire of travelling nor the emotions. All these are there, waiting for the necessary means to be provided in order to get boosted, practising and taking part in it on a natural way.

Santiago Salgado Balbellido
Polibea Turismo Director
turismo@polibea.com

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