Purpose of this Web Page:

Historic downtown La Crosse, WI is a beautiful area with a lot to offer.  There are a lot of activities to do in downtown.  There are numerous Bar and grills to eat at, terrific hotels, movie theaters, as well as riverside park on the Mississippi River.  Also, the Oktoberfest and Riverfest grounds are located in downtown La Crosse.  Unfortunately, some of these activities may not accommodate those with disabilities very well.  This website was designed by Mike Herlihy and Josh Lehrkamp, who are  physical therapy students at University of Wisconsin La Crosse as a resource for disabled individuals that want to experience downtown La Crosse but do not know what establishments are accessible.

This website ranks Hotels, Restaurants, bars, and other attractions in the downtown La Crosse area in terms of accessibility for disabled individuals.

What we did:

We went out to downtown La Crosse businesses and took various measurements around the interior of the buildings and asked the staff questions about their businesses' ability to accommodate disabled patrons.  We then used this information to compile a brief overview of theses places.  We based our decisions upon accepted values from the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) for each of the measurements we took. Here are the following links we used to compare our findings with what would be considered acceptable for these businesses to be considered handicap accessible:

•  Guidelines for restaurant accessibility

•  Guidelines for hotel accessibility

Follow the navigation bar on the left of the page to see how to break down these restaurants in terms of entrances, seating, bathrooms, as well as any other general comments we found would help you in deciding whether or not to visit these establishments

Ranking hotels and restaurants

After comparing our measurements to the guidelines above, we then ranked these establishments using a 4 Star Rating Scale:

• 4 stars were given to businesses that we feel provide optimal accessibility for people with disabilities 
• 3 stars were given to businesses that we feel are very accessible to people with disabilities but may give a few difficulties to people.
• A 2 star rating was given to business that we feel are “average”.  Their businesses are accessible but could benefit from a few improvements. 
• A one star rating was given to businesses that we feel need major improvements.  These businesses lack a majority of the features that would allow them to be accessible to disabled individuals.
• Zero stars were given to a business if we felt that business was not accessible to people with disabilities.