The Sensory Trust Access Chain

by Lars Stenberg

We developed the Access Chain when working on our Evaluation Toolbox, and used it as part of the framework for the Countryside Agency publication.

The Access Chain is a tool that shows the visitor experience as a chain of events that begins with off-site information and decision to visit, continues through the journey to the site to the experience on site and ends with the safe return home. If any link in this chain is broken then what should be a pleasant day out, can turn to disappointment, or may never happen. The chain shows the range of management responses that are relevant at each stage.

Access is a chain of events that begins with the decision to visit and ends with the visitor’s safe return home. Many access improvements that have little impact on visitor numbers, do so because they have been made in a piecemeal way with no regard to this chain of events. For instance, a new accessible visitor centre may fail to improve visitor numbers if there is no accessible car parking nearby, and it has not been promoted in the right way to the right people. No improvement should ever be made in isolation. Think links.

The Access Chain has been developed by the Sensory Trust, to simplify the process of joining up access work. By thinking of access as a chain of events, it becomes apparent that failing to provide for every link in the visitor experience can mean that the visit may end with the visitor feeling frustrated, or, more likely, the visit may not happen at all.

The Access Chain describes access as it is experienced from a visitor’s perspective. It is not a model for the order in which improvements should be undertaken.

More detailed information is contained in our Access Chain online information sheet.

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