Introduction
The Summer 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games are accelerating plans to improve disabled access in and around the French capital. But plans for the Paris public transport network have sparked concern.
Script
Narrator: Between the pavements, road works and other obstacles, it’s an olympic feat to get around Paris in a wheelchair.
Serge Mabally, Vice President, France Disability: You need to be a bit sporty in Paris.
Narrator: Fortunately for him, Serge Mabally is one of the best wheelchair tennis players in France. The Paris 2024 organizers have promised inclusive and accessible games. But with less than a year to go, there’s a lot still to do.
Mabally: this is the metro that I would have taken, but as you can see there are steps. I can’t go down them in a wheelchair so it looks like I’ll have to find a plan B.
Narrator: During next year’s games much of the French Capital should be closed to traffic. Progress has been made, but getting to the future olympic venues on public transport requires some patience.
Mabally: Without my handicap this would have taken me 11 minutes but the route was a bit of a nightmare so it’s taken 40 minutes. It requires a lot of planning time because you have to anticipate the journey. Let’s just say we can’t get around completely carefree.
Narrator: But the accessibility challenge doesn’t lie solely in public transport.
Paris Olympics Infrastructure Official: We’re expecting four or five thousand wheelchair users per day during the Olympics and Paralympic Games. As it stands we estimate that there is only accessible accommodation for 2, 900 visitors
Narrator: Last autumn, charities sounded an alarm bell and are now stakeholders in Olympic Committee decisions. Nowhere does this show more than in the Olympic Village where a network of ramps and shuttles has been put in place.
Ludvine Munoz, Head of Paralympic Integration, Paris 2024: When we work now, we listen to charities because they represent the users. So once every three months we sit around the table with 115 charities.
Narrator: When it comes to changing attitudes on disability, it’s the winning not the taking part that counts.
Quiz
1. It's an Olympic ________ to get around Paris in a wheelchair.Discussion
- Do you think Paris or the city where you live is accessible to disabled people?
- Should improved handicapped accessibility be an infrastructure priority in your city?
- What are some of the measures that need to be taken to improve accessibility and better integrate differently abled people into society at large?