Photo: 123rf
Enjoying the outdoors may seem like the ultimate free activity, but not everyone can take part. That is hopefully about to change, with the launch of new Outdoor Accessibility Design Guidelines in Rotorua on Friday afternoon.
The guidelines provide clear, practical advice for anyone involved in creating, maintaining, or advocating for accessible outdoor spaces. They are a first for New Zealand and focus on improving access to places like beaches, lakes, parks, and trails, with a strong emphasis on making outdoor recreation more inclusive.
Recreation Aotearoa's chief executive Sarah Murray said designing tracks and trails to be widely accessible should happen in the planning stage, but there are easy changes that can be made to existing facilities.
"[An] example is cutting back overhanging vegetation along trails. This increases the trail width and can make a huge difference for people who are blind or have low vision, people in wheelchairs, and people with prams."
Mark Mandeno, quadriplegic for a decade after a surfing accident, agreed.
"My passion now is mountain biking, I have a three-wheel bike, it's about 80cm wide so there are physical structures that stop that from getting on a trail. Once it's on the trail, I might be fine ... a gate, or a bollard or a chain at the beginning, that could be the end."
Mandeno - on the Outdoors Accessibility Working Group - thought most barriers to accessibility were not intentional, but thoughtless.
"People don't choose to put these barriers there to prevent people with impairments access, [but] that's the consequence."
One in four New Zealanders live with a disability, but by the time we pass 65, 50 percent have some kind of impairment. Mandeno said over a lifetime we all find ourselves on a continuum of ability, so improving accessibility helps everyone.
Hiking track in the native bushland of the Totara Park in Auckland. Photo: 123RF
Murray pointed to the recent upgrade of the Tarawera Landing Reserve in Rotorua as an example of considering accessibility in the design phase of the project at low or no additional cost.
"The new picnic tables are intentionally set back from the main pathway to avoid creating obstacles for those using the path, and the contrast in surfacing between the wooden boardwalk and the concrete landing under the tables, provides a tactile indicator for people with a vision impairment."
The new guidelines were designed for those planning, designing and maintaining outdoor facilities and cover how to include accessibility from the start of a project, how to work alongside the disability community to create inclusive design, and practical guidance on accessible signage, trials, parking, toilets, picnic areas, drinking fountains, rubbish bins, jetties, fishing pontoons, and maimais (duck shooting huts).
They were developed by Recreation Aotearoa in collaboration with an Outdoors Accessibility Working Group - a team of industry professionals and accessibility experts, including people with lived experience of disability.
Murray said Friday's launch was to share and celebrate the guidelines alongside the many people who have helped develop them over the last three years. After that, the organisation will be working to get the guidelines in front of as many people as it could, including its membership of recreation professionals from sectors across the country.
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