Project background

VisitOSLO has since 2004 presented information about accessibility at the city’s hotels, restaurants and attractions. Integration of this type of information with other tourist information is very important for us, and is, as far as we know, unique in the travel industry in Norway and perhaps also in Europe. Our target groups are guests with wheelchairs, baby prams, trolleys etc., guests with walking difficulties, guests with visual impairments, guests with hearing impairments and guests with asthma and/or allergies.

In the beginning of 2004 we entered a pilot project in cooperation with the Delta centre (Directorate for Health and Social Affairs) and Tellus IT (supplier of our information database). The work with the “Delta project” resulted in a database with detailed information about accessibility. The Delta centre was responsible for the checklists, and we got advice from organisations like The Norwegian Association of the Disabled, The Norwegian Blind Association, The Norwegian Deaf Association and The Norwegian Asthma and Allergy Association. The results were registered in the Tellus database and published on Visitoslo.com free of charge for the venues we assessed. 
 
The pilot gave us useful knowledge, and in the summer of 2006 we joined an EU-supported project; OSSATE (One-Stop-Shop for Accessible Tourism in Europe). We needed to update the information we had, and in addition we acknowledged the need for improving functionality for various reasons;
- the amount of information provided was huge
- the guests’ needs were extremely varied and complex

OSSATE is a collaboration project between different organisations in Europe (both destination management companies and handicap organisations). Together they have created common checklists on different levels, and information about the facilities at hotels, museums and restaurants are presented in a common interface on the web site www.europeforall.com. We use the same information base here on our own website, but with our own search function and the possibility to create your own profiles. VisitOSLO has gathered the information based on OSSATE’s level 2 access audit, which implies that VisitOSLO as an independent party has visited and audited the venues according to a comprehensive checklist provided by the project partners.

It is Oslo’s intention that visitors to the city find all the necessary information through our website visitoslo.com. People with special needs should not have to visit a specialised website for people with their disability. They are to find the information they need in the same site where they find general information about what to see and do in Oslo.

The results of the OSSATE project were launched on visitoslo.com in the summer of 2007, and accessibility information for approximately 100 of the city’s hotels, meeting facilities, attractions and restaurants is available. We will evaluate the functionality, and will appreciate any feedback from the users!

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