New Brochure: “Barrier-Free Frankfurt”

“Barrier-free Frankfurt”, a new brochure featuring pertinent information for disabled travellers

Frankfurt, (tcf). With “Barrier-free Frankfurt”, the Frankfurt Tourist+Congress Board (TCF) has published a new brochure developed specifically for disabled travellers. The brochure, officially presented at the International Tourism Bourse (ITB) 2012 in Berlin, aims to promote Frankfurt’s many touristic attractions, focusing in particular on their ease of accessibility and various other disability-friendly aspects. The TCF recently reviewed its entire range of city tours with the aim of making them comprehensively barrier-free, adding new tours and restructuring existing ones in the process.

“Barrier-free Frankfurt am Main” provides comprehensive travel information for handicapped persons, helping them to plan, book and realise their trips with a minimum of hassle. The brochure’s individual chapters inform on a variety of handicapped-related aspects, e.g., whether a sightseeing attraction, festival or trade show offers barrier-free access, has toilets for disabled persons or permits guide dogs on the premises. ”Barrier-Free Frankfurt” also offers detailed information on the accessibility of Frankfurt Int’l Airport, the main train station and the city’s public transportation network as a whole. Moreover, it provides a selection of relevant addresses, such as those of pharmacies and medical supply stores. A separate leaflet lists the contact details of hotels featuring particularly wheelchair-friendly guest-rooms. Finally, the brochure also includes a special city map indicating public toilets and parking spaces for the handicapped as well as a comprehensive network plan of the RMV.

Optically, the new brochure differs in style from other TCF brochures. Barrier-free design was applied in catering specifically to the target group in question. The generous A4 format, a minimum font size of 12 dots, black print on a white background and clear lines in regard to text and image all combine to ensure that the special needs of vision-impaired readers are met. Symbols that represent the respective chapter headings, a clearly arranged content structure and a user-friendly layout help to further improve reader orientation. The brochure’s ring binding, meanwhile, makes it easier to stay on a specific page, e.g., to keep it in place on the lap of a wheelchair-bound individual.
The TCF also took great care in using the pictograms also used by the City of Frankfurt’s Office for Disability Affairs. This municipal sub-department has been at the forefront of Frankfurt’s barrier-free efforts for many years, publishing a “Disabled Persons Guide” for the past decade. It is also in charge of a special online portal for disabled persons, accessible at www.frankfurt-handicap.de. The TCF has adapted its new brochure to the contents of this city guide, taking into consideration the best interests of disabled travellers wherever possible.

The TCF’s range of guided city tours has also been redesigned in recent months. The tours now provide even greater barrier freedom for disabled participants. The newly developed “Touchable Frankfurt” tour pays particular attention to the needs of vision-impaired persons, featuring many anecdotes, touch objects and taste tests. All of the TCF’s public guided tours may be adapted to be fully wheelchair-accessible, with sign language interpreters available free of charge upon prior request.

Disabled persons represent a growing target group for the tourism industry. When considering that special assistance is often required not only by handicapped individuals but parents with strollers or prams, travellers with heavy luggage and an increasing number of senior citizens, it becomes clear that the extended target group will in the near future represent over fifty percent of the overall population. With its barrier-free measures, the TCF is following the example of many other German cities in adequately addressing the needs of this significant target group. Thomas Feda, the managing director of the Frankfurt Tourist+Congress Board, sums up his company’s efforts: “With the further redevelopment of our barrier-free service spectrum, we have significantly improved our overall offer range, a fact that may well be decisive in bringing even more national and international travellers to Frankfurt.”

Contact:
Frankfurt Tourist+Congress Board, Kaiserstr. 56, 60329 Frankfurt, Germany
c/o Ms. Gisela Moser, Tel: +49 (0) 69 / 21 23 03 98, Fax: +49 (0) 69 / 21 23 78 80,
E-mail: barrierefrei@infofrankfurt.de, Internet: www.frankfurt-tourismus.de