Disney is reportedly no longer offering beach wheelchairs at Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon and Disney’s Blizzard Beach.
Instagram user Gem Hubbard (@wheelsnoheels_) shared an Instagram post of the beach wheelchairs previously offered at the park, sharing her disappointment that they were no longer available.
“I’ve recently learned that Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard Beach have stopped offering, or are quietly phasing out, their beach wheelchairs, and it’s left me pretty disheartened,” she said.
“Today I was told that Typhoon Lagoon no longer has them at all. Blizzard Beach might still have one, but you can’t hire it out for the whole day anymore the way you’ve seen in my earlier vlogs, and from what I’m hearing, it’s likely on its way out there too.“
According to her, she found a statement on Disney’s website stating that Blizzard Beach does not provide waterproof or water-accessible wheelchairs for the park’s pools and attractions. Guests will need to bring their own equipment. Rentals in the park are strictly for land-use wheelchairs.
Hubbard also wrote about the recent DAS policy changes and how that “already shut a lot of disabled visitors out of the parks entirely.”
“Now it feels like the accommodations that were still working are being stripped away too, and it’s hard not to be upset by that,” she said.
“Because for me, the water parks were something I genuinely loved, and the beach wheelchair was the one thing that made them possible. Losing it isn’t a small inconvenience. It’s huge.”
DAS Update Controversy
Disney updated their Disability Access Service requirements for Walt Disney World and Disneyland Resort in 2024. Eligibility was limited to guests with a developmental disability like autism or similar, “who are unable to wait in a conventional queue for an extended period of time.” This cuts out many guests with physical disabilities. Guests with conditions like narcolepsy and terminal cancer have been denied the service.
In some cases, cast members have denied guests DAS and controversially suggested they instead practice waiting in line at home or ask for a return time at an attraction.
Disney has continued to tweak elements of DAS and its guidelines, including adding information about the required video call and extending the service’s validity period.
Earlier this year, a discrimination complaint over DAS has moved into the investigation phase after a missed mediation deadline, according to a commentary published by the Orlando Sentinel. The filing comes from a guest who states recent policy changes made safe park access “impossible” for their family, as the guest is a full-time, medically necessary power wheelchair user.
They claimed the new system and suggested alternatives, like queue re-entry or party separation, as “technically and medically unworkable and, in many cases, dangerous.”
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