My Experience

I have been a quadriplegic (C5-6) for 43 years, ample time to have experienced and witnessed the evolution in the airline industry’s accommodations for persons with disabilities. As a university administrator, I traveled to various conferences, meetings and workshops etc. beginning in the mid 80’s. Also, as a private citizen I’ve vacationed somewhat extensively with friends and family using air travel.

Through those years of air travel I have noted one significant change in accommodation. That most striking change is the total lack of change in the air travel experience for persons using wheelchairs.

There has been no change in the humiliation of having no restroom access and being jostled from seat to seat (by well meaning but mostly ill-equipped physically and certainly undertrained in dealing with conditions of disability). There has been no added measure of adjusting for any comfort. There is no change in the embarrassment of being non-discreetly identified as the exception to standard procedure (though well-adjusted persons with disabilities are expected to have adapted to this and other indignities).

This almost total lack of substantive change in accommodations for persons with disabilities is not surprising from an industry that affords less and less physical comfort accommodation for all humans.

As exceptionally creative, innovative, intelligent people we can do better for both the general population and those requiring degrees of accommodation.

The reason for no significant change in engineering, policy or attitudinal accommodation is not complicated. The reason is power. The airlines industry has the power over the federal government and its ability to intervene for its people with disabilities. The government chooses this power arrangement because of some misguided laissez-faire notion and the glaringly evident fact that money influences powerful people and powerful people influence all legislation.

The fact that many of the men and women needing government to provide strong intervention with the airline industry need it because they served and sacrificed to keep our government strong.