Wheelchair users have highlighted accessibility issues at the newly reopened Dun Laoghaire Baths — with the current temporary ramps deemed as too steep.
As The Journal reports, one accessibility advocate described the ramps to the lower-level amphitheatre as “disgraceful”.
“They knew very well that they were building these, as I like to call them, wall-like ramps, because you may as well build walls, they are so steep,” Sean O’Kelly of Access for All said.
The past few weeks we’ve been inundated with messages about the new baths out in #DunLaoghaire and the fact the ramps out there are mountainous.
— Access For All Ireland (@AccessForAll7) January 3, 2023
Sean is a local so we made a couple of videos yesterday, now tell us this public place is inclusive and accessible, go on tell us.? pic.twitter.com/M8eJyiB9Gg
A spokesperson for Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council acknowledged that the site “isn’t currently as accessible for all as we would like it to be” and promised that upgrades would come in the second phase.
However, the tendering process for this phase has yet to be opened. The local authority says it expects to have contractors on site later this year — a situation Access For All decries as “not good enough”.
The Journal has more on the story HERE.
