Autumn City Breaks – Wheelchair Accessible Cities
As the UK weather gets colder, darker and wetter and we start to feel a little uninspired. A great way to rediscover your spark is an Autumn city break! Europe offers a vast amount of beautiful, historic and cultural cities to explore. All of which are fascinating all season round.
Alpharooms has studied the top 15 attractions in each European city, analysing how easy they are to visit for those with limited mobility, or who are reliant on assistance from others. Factors taken into consideration also include public transport access and hotels.
We’ve written about our 3 favourite wheelchair accessible cities.
Borås, Sweden
The second largest city in Sweden, Boras.
In 2015, the Swedish parliament brought in a new law to make lack of accessibility a form of discrimination – to help those who are less able to get around just as easily. Therefore, many hotels are wheelchair accessible. The hotels provide specially adapted rooms for those who might have mobility limitations or suffering from allergies. Some also have technical aids to enable those with limited mobility to take part in activities like swimming or riding.
Borås Djurpark – The city’s top attraction is an ethical, thoughtfully designed zoo on the northern outskirts. With 6 toilet buildings allocated around the park, water taps to refill your bottles and in addition the zoo also offer wheelchairs for hire.
Textilmuseet – The Textile Museum is in the city’s former industrial area and documents this trade. Mapping out the development in technology from the middle of the 1800’s and showing how the working lives of the industry’s employees changed over time. Immerse yourself in the rich history and beautiful fabrics of this fantastic textile museum.
No Limit Street Art – Borås is showered with breath taking street art! Take a guided tour departing from the Textile Fashion Center. The tour lasts for about 1.5 hours and comprises of 4 kilometres. The tour avoids stairwells and other difficult obstacles. There are also sight and sign interpreted tours too.
Paris, France
Paris is the capital and most populous city of France.
Musée du Louvre – The Louvre is perhaps most famous for the Mona Lisa and for its unique architectural triangular building. In keeping with France’s 2005 disability law, making the Louvre more accessible to visitors with disabilities has been one of the museum’s main priorities. Wheelchair users and mobility scooter users can go to the front of the line to ride the unique piston-like lift down to the lobby.
Sainte-Chapelle– Sainte Chapelle is a Gothic church which presents some of the most outstanding stained glass windows in Europe. Accessible via a lift. Take a look at this detailed blog post for more.
Eiffel Tower– A trip to Paris would not be complete without visiting the Eiffel Tower. The Eiffel Tower has adapted some facilities for disabled visitors. Disabled visitors can reach the 2nd highest platform by using the lift. Priority access with no wait is granted.
Berlin, Germany
Germany’s capital city.
Museum Island– Island Museum is magnificent, a truly outstanding ensemble of five world-renowned museums- built between 1824-2930. Each museum differs in accessibility, but they are all mostly accessible.
Berlin Cathedral– Located on Museum Island, the magnificent dome of the Cathedral Church (Berliner Dom) is one of the main landmarks in Berlin’s cityscape! With its elaborate decorative and ornamental designs, the church interior is especially worth seeing! The cathedral can be entered via a lift. For more details take a read of this fantastic blog.
Alte Nationalgalerie– Berlin’s National Art Gallery displays a rich collection of Neoclassical, Romantic, Biedermeier, Impressionist and early Modernist artwork. Wheelchair access is possible through a door on the right side of the building. There is lift access to each floor of the gallery.
