The Recent “Princess Bed” Trend at Hotels
The story of the princess beds…In recent years, hotels have begun to ‘upgrade’ the beds that they have in their rooms. I call them ‘Princess beds’ because they look like the beds in the story “The Princess and the Pea” they keep getting higher and higher. The hotels apparently think they look better, but by installing these ‘princess beds’ they are actually violating the specifics of the Americans with Disabilities Act that dictates how high the level of the bed can be in a room designated as ADA.
Does this stop the resort from installing these beds in these rooms? Much to my continuous frustration, no. According to the ADA (Title III Accommodations) hotel beds have to have a height between 20 to 23 inches from the floor to the top of the mattress in accessible guest rooms. If the bed in the room does not meet this specification, the hotel must accommodate the wheelchair guest and make whatever adjustments are necessary.
I was recently at the Paris Las Vegas hotel for a Travel Agent Forum conference (March 2017), for the second year in a row, the room I was provided had a bed with a height of at least 30 inches high. When I spoke to the front desk, I was informed that the hotel recently underwent renovations and that ALL of their rooms now had the new bedding. I advised that I could not get into the bed at all, the front desk representative spoke to a manager, and advised that they were going to move me to another room. I assumed the new room would have a lowered bed, but it didn’t, it was exactly the same. While waiting for that room to become available, they offered to send a roll-away up to my room to see if that would suffice. It did not, it was much too low.
I don’t want to come across as Goldilocks in ‘The Three Bears’ Fable, “this one is too low, this one is too high, I want one that is just right…” Having the ability to scoot evenly from my wheelchair seat across onto the bed mattress is what I require in order to gain access to the bed. Wheelchair seats fall within the 20-23 inch height threshold, so when provided, are easily accessible for the wheelchair-user.
After my third attempt at finding resolution, the hotel finally realized that they needed to accommodate me somehow, and finally came up with the solution of taking out the bedframe from the bed in my room. It was perfect! Why the hotel hadn’t thought of this before or even attempted to accommodate the required height of the beds in their ADA rooms following their recent renovation is beyond me…but it is situations like this that are constant and what I call ‘attitudinal’ discrimination. Since this experience, I have sent the hotel manager my request to have the bedframes removed from the beds in all of the ADA rooms, but my email was not responded to.
The fight continues, but knowing my rights and the specifics of the Americans with Disabilities Act, allows me to confidently advise that my needs have to be acknowledged and accommodated.
–By Dawn Beers O’Brien, Dream Vacations’ Travel Specialist