A national park in Michigan has just become the first one ever to implement heavy-duty wheelchairs so that disabled people can enjoy the scenery on their trails.

Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore has started offering visitors the “track chair,” which is a wheelchair that is equipped with treads allowing whoever is using it to navigate the steep hills and sandy trenches of the park. Launched in May, the track chair program was started by Friends Of Sleeping Bear Dunes, which is an organization that specializes in making the park more accessible to visitors.

“Here at Sleeping Bear Dunes, about half the park is designated wilderness so in those areas we can’t do a lot of maintenance or changes [to increase accessibility,]” explained group board chairman Kerry Kelly. “So the better option is to have a vehicle that can take the person into these areas so they can experience the trail as it is without having to make major modifications.”

While the track chair can currently only be rented for the 1.5-mile long Bay View Trail, the park has said that dozens of visitors have already used it. It is completely free for visitors to use the chair as long as they book it a few days in advance.

Now, Friends Of Sleeping Bear are hoping to buy an additional track chair for young visitors to use by the end of the summer. They want to encourage other national parks to start offering this chair or something like it for their guests to use as well. Everyone should be allowed to enjoy the beauty of our nations national parks, regardless of their disabilities!