Making the railway accessible for all to enjoy
Partnerships play an important role here at the North Yorkshire Moors Railway - whether it’s the Heritage Railway Association, Visit York, North York Moors National Park or simply our local community.
Our latest collaboration is with Visit England and its North York Moors Accessibility Project, an initiative to help the region’s tourism bounce back post pandemic, by developing and promoting a high-quality accessible tourism itinerary, highlighting all the accessible venues, hotels and attractions in the North York Moors for people with access requirements.
NYMR is just one of 15 businesses involved – which also includes the National
Park, Inn on the Moor Hotel, Whitby Abbey, Sutton Bank and Helmsley Walled Garden – so we’re also partnering with them as well as Visit England, to tap into the ‘purple pound’ and make sure our attractions and venues are accessible to all.
Funded by Visit England, the project is also being supported by Access For All UK, who are giving free mentoring to all of the participants, which includes site visits and advice to help us put together our own accessibility guides.
As part of this, Sandra McNicoll, our Customer Services and Booking Office Manager, and I have signed up to the Accessible Champions’ disability awareness training, which will help the whole team ensure NYMR has every element covered when it comes to accessibility.
The ultimate goal of the Visit England project is for visitors to have an accessibility guide for the whole area, so they can easily plan an itinerary which takes in as much of the beauty that the North York Moors has to offer.
Central to our accessibility offering at the NYMR will be our four fully accessible ‘fuss free’ coaches which we’re launching in April 2023; the coaches are part of the £10 million Yorkshire’s Magnificent Journey project which was designed to transform the railway. This will mean that all of our carriage sets in service will contain one historic carriage that has been specially adapted to ease access for everyone with access requirements and accommodate them with their friends and family.
The coaches benefit from ramps, accessible toilets and accessible seating areas, so that everyone can experience and enjoy the 24 miles of stunning scenery that the railway offers.
The Fuss Free Coaches will be one of the last of the seven Yorkshire’s Magnificent Journey projects to be completed which was funded by grants from the European
Union, the National Lottery Heritage Fund, the Department of Environment Farming and Rural Affairs, the Local Enterprise Partnership and by donations from the charity’s members and supporters.
At NYMR we’ve also secured s106 funding with the help of Visit England to equip the railway with a host of useful equipment – from portable hearing loops to large-handled cutlery, toilet raisers to magnifiers. We want as many people as possible to enjoy our fabulous heritage railway.
All of this is part of the bigger picture for both the NYMR and the region as a whole; it’s an exciting time and we hope to have as many people as possible with us on the journey.
(Photo: Charlotte Graham)