Image: Melbourne Cable Park Accessible Wakeboarding. Photograher Bill Forrester.
The Australian Tourism Data Warehouse (ATDW) is Australia’s national platform for digital tourism information on Australia. Incorporated in 2001, it is jointly owned and managed by all Australian state/territory government tourism bodies.
The ATDW collects information via its partners then stores and distributes this information. Data includes product and destination information from all Australian States and Territories, with more than 40,000 listings. This content is compiled in a nationally agreed format and is electronically accessible by tourism business owners (operators), wholesalers, retailers and distributors for use in their websites and booking systems.
.ATDW is collaborating with Local Government NSW (LGNSW) and DNSW to enable Australian tourist destinations, products and services to accurately highlight their accessible facilities to the Inclusive Tourism market.
It will soon become a mandatory component for all operators registered with the ATDW to respond to the additional accessibility questions in the revised data set .
Becoming a feature of the ATDW database in the near future, the new accessibility data will encourage operators to become more aware of the inclusive tourism market and will provide additional info for online distributors to share across their consumer facing websites.
The system will also have the provision to link a detailed Accessibility Guide to the ATDW listing.
The new criteria should be available by the middle of this year now now is the time to start thinking about your accessibility and creating your Accessibility Guide to take full advantage of your ATDW listing.
What is an Accessibility Guide?
An Accessibility Guide is produced by tourism operators to provide potential visitors with important accessibility information about a venue, property or service. The guide enables individuals with accessibility requirements, their family and friends to make informed decisions as to where to stay and visit in view of their requirements. This includes not just wheelchair users but people with hearing loss, visual or mental impairment, older people, families with young children and more.
Why should you produce one?
- It can help you to appraise your venue’s accessibility
- It provides essential information for people with accessibility requirements.
- It’s a marketing opportunity to broaden the appeal of your business.
- Unless accessibility information is clearly available, visitors may choose to go elsewhere.
How to write an Accessibility Guide
It is important, in wring an accessibility guide to avoid statements such as “we are fully accessible” or “meet accessibility standards”
Every disability is different so it is important to give as much information as possible to allow potential clients to decide for themselves whether your establishment is suitable for their needs. Details should address where the parking is, whether the entry is level, details on door widths, method of opening and paths to reception, rooms, cafes, gardens and other facilities. The information should be accompanied by good quality images shot without people to show the full details. If your camera or phone is equipped with a high dynamic range facility (HDR) switch it on as it will help to bring out the detail in the shadows.
We have detailed measurement and photographic guides that will help you put together the detailed information that should appear in an Accessibility Guide.
Finally the most important thing to remember is that an Accessibility Guide is your marketing tool to the large and growing Accessible Tourism market. It should have the same look and feel and writing style as the rest of your website.
It is not an audit checklist!!!
