Overview

One of the big chains of cinemas, the Vue Cinema in Stirling has 8 screens and shows all the latest films. We found it to be accessible by wheelchair, and staff were friendly.

Transport & Parking

There is a large public car park just next to the cinema. It has a number of marked disabled bays. Otherwise you have to pay at ticket machine to park, but it is a set rate of a couple of pounds for a full day's parking, so is very reasonable. The cinema is also very close to the train station, and there are local buses too.

Access

The pavements from car park to cinema all have areas of lowered kerbs. It is a flat level entrance from the pavement into the cinema building. There are push button /automatic doors, but these were set to just stay open on the day we visited (it was a hot, sunny day, so think this was just to let air into the building!) Inside the floors are flat/level. As soon as we took our CEA card out, this was recognised and process of getting tickets was straight-forward. The cinema we were in, all the spaces for wheelchair users is at the front of the room - some people prefer this, some don't. There were seats at sides of these for carers /family. Before going into the cinema, I noticed there was a diagram of the seating layout on the wall, this was useful, especially if going in when the room is already dark. The rest of the seating was tiered, with steps at the sides. There were accessible (and standard) toilets in the same corridor as the cinema screens. I am unsure if the layout within the other screens is the same - we only saw the one we were in! I did notice a lift in the entrance area, but I'm unsure where this takes you to.

Toilets

There were accessible toilets, these were clean and looked after. Red cords were hanging freely. There appeared enough room - but we didn't actually use them. The toilet-roll was on the wall, it seemed like it might be quite far away for some people to reach. There were supports to both sides of the toilet. Within the 'standard' ladies toilets, there were also two cubicles which were larger than average, and these had safety/ support handles on the walls. I thought this was really good to see, as not everyone with a disability uses a wheelchair nor requires to use a large accessibility toilet. Also there are many people who do not consider themselves to have a disability but are a little unsteady etc. I did not see any signage to show that these were there. The cinema says it does autism friendly, subtitled and audio described screenings - we didn't use these on our visit.

Staff

Staff were friendly and efficient. When we came in with CEA card they recognised this immediately and processed our tickets. They told us which cinema screen we were going to, described where the wheelchair spaces were, and which way we needed to go. I felt they gave us all the information we needed but without making any 'fuss' or drawing unnecessary attention to our access needs.

Photos