25 Feb
Sensory Parks for the Visually Impaired
A Sensory Park for the visually impaired has recently been created in Chandigarh, India. The local Institute for the Blind teamed up with the administration and Municipal Corporation to create a park similar to that for the blind in other parts of the world. The park has many aromatic herbs and medicinal plants like jasmine, lavlena, albertine, mint, neem, tulsi, and bamboo which visitors can smell and touch. Other parts of Asia have similar gardens. For example, Osaka, Japan has a wheelchair Sensory Garden where visitors can touch the exhibits (including sculptures). In the UK, there are many sensory gardens designed for people with disabilities, including at Hunstanton and Harrow, and in the USA, the National Garden Clubs website lists many such gardens in many states. Australia also has at least some such gardens for people with sight impairment and other disabilities (such as at the Lucas Garden School), and New Zealand has at least one. The Sensation Walk Braille Trail in the Wellington Botanical Gardens is a 20 minute meander from the Treehouse, up to a Herb Garden and then a Rose Garden. The trail features a selection of plants and landscape elements chosen to stir the senses. Features on the trail are marked with Braille posts and tactile footpath markers.
