Rolling Rains Report:

Why Accessible Buses Are Important

Mark Roger writes for Travel Agent Central. Fortunately for those of us with disabilities he has an ear for a good story -- and an eye for an interesting companion on a bus ride. I wonder how much better known the needs of travelers with disabilities would be if public transportation were accessible and conversation like this were taking place daily everywhere around the world:

I regularly attend travel forums and expos around the world. If I'm on my game, the morning bus ride from the hotel to the convention center can yield interesting conversations — sometimes the most interesting of the day. While attending the ASEAN Tourism Forum in Bangkok last month, my seat mate was Volker Posselt, managing director of RollOn Travel, a Germany-based company that specializes in handicapped travel to Thailand.

Posselt is a fierce advocate of accessible travel, with nine years in the tour business, having first starting in India. The disabled and their partners make up 90 percent of the company's tour participants. Posselt accompanies many of the tours himself and designs most of the programs, and has personally inspected every hotel and all the sightseeing experiences offered by RollOn Travel.

"It's my job to prepare tours so they move smoothlyV and the non-handicapped participants aren't frustrated," says Posselt.