New Website Helps Everyone 'Explore Boston'

Should you take a family member who’s hard of hearing to the Huntington Theatre? Will you be able to tour the Freedom Trail comfortably in a wheelchair? Or even with a stroller?

Those are the questions that Bostonian Nora Nagle is trying to answer – for tourists and residents alike – through her new website, ExploreBoston.com.

Nagle founded the site, which lists dozens of Boston attractions and information about hours, location and accessibility, after sightseeing with her 10-year-old son.

“As I was taking him around to all the places that you have to take your kids…I noticed a lot of them weren’t offering information about what was and wasn’t accessible,” she said in a recent interview. “There is no standard way to present the information…it was all over the place.”

Nagle, who is legally blind, was especially surprised that the Freedom Trail, one of Boston’s most popular attractions, provides no information regarding accessibility on its website. For people with limited mobility or families with strollers and young children, that information is imperative, she said.

On ExploreBoston, Nagle provides separate pages for each attraction on the Freedom Trail. An entry for Copp’s Hill Burying Ground provides a brief history as well as accessibility information (the burying ground is accessed by a narrow staircase and is at the top of a very steep hill). For visitors with visual impairments, the entry notes that the gravestones “can be touched, and many contain traditional carvings…[or] dents from colonial musket fire.”

In creating the website, Nagle said she hoped to create a one-stop hub of information for visitors and residents with or without disabilities. All entries contain general information and descriptions, with a tab for accessibility information labeled "Getting Around." Nagle said she steered away from using disability "buzz words” that could be a turn-off to those who don’t identify themselves in that way.

“It’s really for everyone,” she said. “There are so many people with disabilities whether they choose to accept them or not. It’s just a natural course of human life.”

During the course of her research, Nagle found that many venues that were not accessible either buried the information on their webpage or did not include it at all. In the case of Copp’s Hill, simply informing the public of the steep grade and staircase would make a world of difference for visitors, Nagle said.

“I’ve been on tours and seen people just completely unprepared because they weren’t given the proper information,” she said. “It’s no one’s fault. You can’t move the hill.”

Nagle received a Gopen Fellowship in 2010 for the project, allowing her to conduct the necessary research before launching the site a year later. She's hoping to continue to expand the site as it gains followers, but acknowledged that having a full time job makes that difficult. Nagle currently works as an ADA and 504 Accessibility Coordinator at the Museum of Science.

“It’s a question of time, money and people,” she acknowledged. “There aren’t too many websites like this.”