Cultural Journal 6 - Accessability

The Giant’s Causeway was an amazing site to visit, and I am thoroughly please that I was able to do so. But one thing that troubled me here was the lack of handicap access to the site. It’s something I noticed more than once in Ireland, visiting historic and cultural sites in relatively remote areas; often I would see a sign noting that the area was not accessible. I can see both sides of this issue, and wish that I had been able to get a solid answer as to why accessibility wasn’t present (the answer I got was, essentially, that it would mar the site).
On the one hand, putting in accessibility for wheelchairs (to take the obvious example) would irrevocably alter a landscape that the Irish government has clearly taken great pains to preserve. In order for someone with limited mobility to visit the causeway itself, they would first have to be transported down to the base of the cliffs. This could be accomplished using the trams (in modified form) that already exist to carry visitors from the top to the bottom. Next, they would have to make it across the landscape to the pillars, requiring the installation of some kind of walkway which was not only wide enough to permit simultaneous entrance and egress, but gentle enough of a slope to make it useable. Any such structure would need to be anchored, requiring holes to be bored in the pillars themselves, or at the very least heavy and wide struts to be installed. It would also need to be weatherproof, and given the ocean exposure of the site this would be no mean feat. Many tourists would likely make use of the ramp even if they are perfectly capable of traversing the landscape, putting extra wear on the structure. This would be an expensive endeavor.
But on the other hand, it’s a shame that people with limited mobility are effectively barred from the site, unless they can be helped or even carried by others. The Causeway is such an amazing place that it is a damn shame that some are denied viewing it, and there is a large part of me that feels like it would be worth the expense and relatively slight alteration of the site to enable them to reach it. I suppose that’s the American in me (heaven forbid!) crying out that everyone should have equal access at almost any cost, but I think it’s a valid perspective. Of course, I’m not Irish, and I don’t know the internal decisions and struggles that have surely arisen form this very issue, but my instinct tells me that where there’s a will there’s a way, and that the heritage trust (who I believe oversees all sites in both Northern Ireland and the Republic) would be doing a wonderful thing to find a way to make this and other sites accessible.