Holiday Travel Should Make Room for Everyone

(PRWEB) December 11, 2004

Along with gift-giving, eating and religious celebrations, travel is one of the largest parts of the holiday season. More people travel during the Thanksgiving weekend than any other time of the year, and the period between Christmas Eve and New Year’s Day is the second most popular time to travel.

Traveling always brings stress to travelers. Frustrations with means of transportation, the expense of transportation and simply interrupting routines can create tension among even the closest of family members. Most people expect this stress and allow for it in their planning.

But, according to Dr. Thomas, there are added stressors for certain groups of people when they travel.

“Larger people are often faced with the added stress of finding accommodations for their size in a one-size-fits-all world,” says Thomas. “The fact that they never know whether a seat will be large enough for them, a restroom stall will be a tight squeeze or they will face added expense in order to use an airline, makes traveling more than an adventure. It makes it a nightmare for many.”

Co-creator of the website The Ample Traveler (http://theampletraveler.com), Dr. Thomas hopes that the travel industry will change its thinking and treat larger people as the potentially loyal consumers that they can be.

“After all,” says Thomas, “this industry is about accommodating the needs of people. Only prejudice is standing in the way of the travel industry taking the time to understand and to provide specific services for this market segment. If the industry really wants to make money, then it should include accommodations for differences among their potential customers. Everyone has special needs when they travel. The fact that some of those needs get accommodated and others don’t is a matter of stigma, not market forces.”

The Ample Traveler emphasizes the need for accommodating differences among people and looks for accessible locations around the country, featuring the most positive examples bi-monthly on their website.

“We look for universal accessibility,” explains Thomas. “Universally accessible places do not group people into special categories but seek to create spaces that can be used by everyone no matter what his size or his need for assistive devices. A large restroom, for example, accommodates a larger person, a person using a wheelchair or a mother with small children. The designer doesn’t have to figure out which group will use the restroom most often but merely designs a large enough space to accommodate multiple and universal needs.”

Thomas will be the guest on this week’s Size Matters, Too, a weekly Internet radio broadcast hosted by size activist and diversity consultant Veronica Cook-Euell. It will air, on demand, at Cook- Euell’s website, http://sizematterstoo.com between midnight (EST) Sunday, December 12, to 11:59pm(EST), Saturday, December 18.

Size Matters, Too is in its third season, broadcasting from Akron, Ohio. Cook-Euell is a speaker and consultant, specializing in helping businesses accommodate larger people, what she calls, “the other diversity.”

"Our mission is to heighten awareness about the treatment and experiences of people of size in the workplace, in society, and in relationships; as well as to move toward a more accepting culture for all human beings," writes Cook-Euell.

The goal of Size Matters, Too is to increase awareness of issues important to people of size.

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