Vancouver Park Board rolls out plans to make beaches more accessible

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – At least one of the city’s beaches could soon be more accessible to people who use a wheelchair or walking frame.

The Vancouver Park Board is finalizing its plans to install ramps at at least one of its local beaches.

Variations of the ramps are used at beaches in other parts of the world and help people using wheelchairs or walking frames make their way through sand to the water.

“We were hoping to have them in by now but the technology’s coming from further away,” says Park Board Chair Michael Wiebe. “I think English Bay, Kits Beach are probably the most utilised beaches so probably the best choices for us to put them so we get the most usage of these facilities.”

Wiebe says the Park Board has been looking at ways to make sure access is available for everyone to enjoy the city’s facilities.

“We want to remove barriers so people can just go use the beach at their leisure, and not feel uncomfortable.”

The Park Board currently has mats available, and hopes to have them rolled out before the end of the summer ones additional parts are received.

“It’s a blue rubber mat version that gets clamped in deep into the sand and then a regular wheelchair can go down to the water’s edge.”

A handful of Australian and American beaches have accessible rubber ramps for those with mobility issues to reach the water without any help.

According to Wiebe other Canadian cities have implemented similar accessibility projects, but conditions here in Vancouver differ from the rest of the country.

“I know some of the lakes in Ontario have ramps, but because they don’t have the tides we have they just put cement right into the water,” he says. “We have a lot of moving sand so it makes it much more difficult for us to utilize that kind of technology.”

Currently, Vancouver does have specially designed wheelchairs with fat, balloon-like tires available at two local beaches, but Wiebe says they don’t work for a lot people.