Author: Rachael Brooks
All Terrain Wheel Chair Demo
Monday, 11th February, 2008 at 5:17 pm, Isle of Wight
| 4, March 2008 | ||
| 11:00 am | to | 12:00 pm |
If you’ve been following discussions on the disability board over on the forum, you’ll have read about the demand for all-terrain wheelchairs in Ventnor.
Two of our most active members on that board, Alan and Chris have arranged for a demonstration of the all terrain wheelchairs to take place on Tuesday 4th March.
These fantastic inventions allow less able bodied people to enjoy going down on the beach without the wheels of their everyday chairs sinking deep into the sand and gravel.
They are also great shock absorbers, which means they provide a less bumpy ride over gravel and rocky areas - one website that supplies them has photos of people going up Mount Fuji in Japan on one.
If you know of anyone who might be interested in seeing the demo of wheelchair, do please let them know.
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March 2nd, 2008 at 4:06 pm
I am interested in this type of accessible chair but as I mainly use a scoot I wonder if there are plans to have scoots with this type of wheel to promote best independence for all.
Where is this demo going to be held please in case I can attend?
March 4th, 2008 at 9:18 am
The demo is on Ventnor Beach at 11am today (Tuesday 4 March)
March 4th, 2008 at 6:53 pm
Many, Many thanks to those that turned out on a cold but sunny day, for the demo - Island Mobility; The IoW County Press; Ventnor Town Councillor B Lucas; County Councillor/Ventnor Town Councillor
J Fitzgerald-Bond, The IoW Gateway Club; Evelyn Knowles (the Beacon); The IoW Council; Jim & Sophie Blake; The Riverside Centre; Ventnor Residents and St Catherine’s School.
Several good ideas and suggestions were made, ie to house the wheelchair in the liftguard station, for the IoW Council and/or a Island based business to purchase and rent out the wheelchairs over all the Isle’s beaches, to launch a Beach Wheelchair Campaign and raise the necessary funds for the service in Ventnor.
I will be following up some of the suggestions outlined, however if any one has ideas of their own please get in touch via the VB Forum.
March 5th, 2008 at 10:56 am
We were considering a holiday in the Isle of Wight , Ventnor area, and have found a suitable holiday home for the wheelchair bound member of our group (aged 10). However, the tourist board have told us all terrain wheelchairs are not available for hire. Last year we holidayed in Dorset where the chairs are available which made a huge improvement to our enjoyment, so we will likely return to Dorset in preference to the IOW.
Please let us know if the facilities are introduced on the IOW.
April 27th, 2008 at 1:09 am
I went to the Isle of Wight Radio Megga Wheels event at the Garlic Festival site today and was shocked at the little preparation that had been done to assist wheelchair /scooter useers as in they hadnt even got a ride on mower to at least cut some pathways around the set up areas yesterday or even better would have been plastic pathways (rolls of plastic matting type material) often used on the mainland to assist mobility.
There was some hesian type matting down in the beer tent but nowhere else.
If they had had the grass cut all over yesterday that in itself would have been so much better but they would have had to use someone with ride on mowers that have colection boxes the type used by local contractors as my poor little scoot got clogged with dry grass that had been cut and left maybe last week.
Maybe someone here would like to contact Alex or David to ask them to consider access issues next time they organise the event and not to tell people the ground was chalky and bare of grass and remind other field events to do likewise or maybe arrange for the all terraine buggies to be available better still stil all teraine scoots.