Paul Hogan's story - Access to Historic Buildings
Channel: National Disability Authority
Date: 2012-06-01

This video was produced for the Access to Heritage Conference that took place on 30th May 2012 at the Law Society, Blackhall Place, Dublin 7. This conference was jointly hosted by the National Disability Authority and the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht. The conference presentations can be found on the NDA website at http://www.nda.ie. The other videos in this set can be found by searching for the tag accesstoheritageconference2012. The transcript for this video is available below.

Paul Hogan's story -- Access to Historic Buildings
I'm Paul Hogan. I am a retired designer with a disability, so I'm interested in the whole issue of access, and have been for quite some years, because of these two strands -- One, the designer strand and the other one -- the disabled person strand. And I got the insight, many years ago, that designers had an enormous influence, on the lives of everybody first of all, but disabled people in particular. You could say disabled people were the victims of bad design, and suffered more than the ordinary man on the street, who can accommodate himself to deficiencies in the environment, whereas very often the person with a disability lacks the capacity to accommodate themselves to these conditions. So it's a very important issue
I remember the first time I saw the Cross of Ahenny, one had to part the foliage to find them, and it was a wonderful sense of discovery. Now, we have -- thanks to the wonderful Board of Works, we have gravel path, access is all arranged, visitors centres and so on, which are great and needed and are well done, but something, maybe, has been lost - ?
I believe and had -- ran a little campaign of my own, to see that every art gallery and every museum should be equipped with wheelchairs which the visitor could ask for, because it changes the experience and really makes it...Em, I remember having a wheelchair in the Sistine Chapel, and that's the only way to look at the Sistine Chapel is by wheelchair -- I'll give you that tip, when you're next in Rome!
I believe we have been very well served in Ireland, by our architects' and by our designers and there are many fine examples of interventions which have respected the integrity of buildings and have added to the overall enjoyment of our buildings.
I walk with sticks, and on a wet day they (surfaces) can be lethal, because the rubber ferrule slips. So I appreciate slightly rough surfaces where I can manager much better.