Accessible Hiking Trails

Forest and Coastal Hiking Trails’ accessibility improvement for different social groups (Accessible Hiking Trails)

Posted on by laura

On September 18th & 19th, in Riga, 10 Latvian and Estonian tourism organizations met together and started work on a new project – Forest and Coastal Hiking Trails’ accessibility improvement for different social groups. The accessibility of hiking trails will be focused on 5 target groups – 1) people with functional impairments (movement, vision, hearing); 2) for seniors; 3) for families with small children, i.e. strollers; 4) for school-aged children; 5) for people with a language or cultural barrier. Trail accessibility will be improved in separate phases.

Event Agenda and presentations:

Project goals:

The project objective is to improve accessibility of the Baltic Hiking trails – the Coastal Hiking Trail and the Forest Trail – for different social groups by implementing accessibility and inclusive marketing solutions in the territory of both trails, in Latvia and Estonia.

Project results:

  1. Project partner organisations will continue cooperation after the project is completed based on a formal agreement to continue cooperation, after the end of the supported project. Project partners will consult the organisations that will uptake the accessibility solutions.
  2. The following pilot solutions will be taken up by organisations:
    1. Wheelchair accessibility solutions to facilitate wheelchair hiking on different surfaces.
    2. Accessibility solutions for impaired vision (audio guides, special signposting, brail, etc.).
    3. Web cam accessibility solutions for trail current condition visualization before the hiking trip (safe hiking planning for seniors, families with young children).
    4. Accessibility solutions adapting hiking for families with young children (short distance hiking loops on trails, attractive and nature educational games and 3D objects while on a hike).
    5. Self-guided hiking skills for school youth.
    6. Adaptation for foreign language and cross-cultural social groups.
    7. Guided hikes for people with disabilities.

Project budget information:

The total budget of the Project is 1 245 027,00 EUR, of which the ERDF Interreg VI-A Estonia – Latvia Programme contribution is 996 021,60 EUR.

KPR total budget of the Project is 139 893,00, of which the ERDF Interreg VI-A Estonia – Latvia Programme contribution is 111 914,40

Project implementation:

The project will be implemented over 3 years – from July 1, 2023 to June 30, 2026. The leading partner of the project is the Latvian Rural Tourism Association “Lauku Celotajs”.