Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum of Dubai: A Fair Sheikh for Travelers with Disabilities
© Scott Paul Rains
Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed is taking Dubai in a direction that has promoters of Inclusive Tourism encouraged.
If you read The Rolling Rains Report every day you probably already know that:
- Santa Cruz County, California would like to be your travel destination of choice if you are a slow walker, use a wheelchair, or are in some way disabled. Community events like "Day in the Sky," "Day on the Beach," "The Santa Cruz County Universal Design Conference," and the US launch of the Vexel Quovis automobile make their invitation appealing.
- San Diego, California - in a bit of healthy North/South California competition would like to entice you in their direction--and they are preparing to hold an Accessible Tourism Conference to convince you.
- New York, New York is rumored to be getting into the act with the accessible tourism conference idea to be the host of the first such event in the USA--and help secure their Olympic/Paralympic host city bid.
Scanning the report for international destinations, it doesn't take long to discover that:
- Valencia, Spain just published a manual on accessible public space in the tradition of similar work in Chile, Argentina, Kenya and a growing number of interesting places.
- Pattaya, Thailand seeks to be "the Accessible City" and will host the follow-up to the Taipei International Conference on Accessible Tourism in 2007 and the International Conference on Peace Through Tourism Conference in October 2005 which always has a section on Inclusive Travel.
- Nairobi, Kenya has announced its own Conference on Accessible Tourism for October 2005 joining Australia, Japan, Taiwan, Brazil, the UK, and Germany who have all hosted national or international conferences on the topic since September 2004.
It is easy to be impressed by a big bankroll ($100 billion US) and the impressive guest list (3 million invitees) but the organizers of an Inclusive Tourism extravaganza in Dubai, United Arab Republic have caught my attention like none of the other events.
Here's what Travel Impact Newswire reported:
The Dubai government says it plans to ensure that the US $100 billion dollars worth of tourism projects emerging in the emirate cater to the needs of disabled travellers, and has called on all its stakeholders to join in the "creation of a society that cares". Noting that "we are all at some point in our lives, disabled people," the government says that building a vision for the future as a preferred tourism and business development centre has to include a "future for the disabled as well".
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