Profile: Accessibility and Safe Streets Advocate Juliette Rizzo
Describing herself as “a vibrant Italian who loves great food and the great outdoors,” Juliette Rizzo recounted a Pennsylvania trail she explored with a park ranger and another person in a power wheelchair who helped her identify—and nibble on!—trailside herbs in a foraging adventure she fondly remembers. Beyond the aromas of herbs and the splashes of color from flowers, she recalled, “I got to apply another sense to trails—that of taste.”
Looking beyond the typical use-case scenario for a trail is pure Rizzo.
A member of Rails to Trails Conservancy’s board of directors, the advisory body that helps chart RTC’s big-picture strategies and direction, Rizzo is a nationally known advocate for safe streets and accessible public spaces. A dynamo of energy and enthusiasm, she’s spent years channeling her journalism degrees, talent as a public speaker and a compelling personal backstory to advocate for others. “We want to make sure that whether it’s streets or trails, they’re safe for everyone, accessible for everyone.”
Champion of Change
“I’ve been given an opportunity to be an advocate, a voice, for making sure that accessibility is not an afterthought.”
— Juliette Rizzo
A host of childhood autoimmune diseases left Rizzo unable to walk, but her experiences in a power wheelchair helped shape her desire to be a champion for change. “I’ve been given an opportunity to be an advocate, a voice, for making sure that accessibility is not an afterthought,” she said.
Rizzo is drawn to rail-trails because the very things that made railway corridors attractive to the rail lines of yore make them more suitable for those with mobility challenges, she said. “Many infrastructure [challenges] are naturally eliminated.”
But overcoming infrastructure challenges often requires a substantial, purposeful effort, as Rizzo knows all too well. Oregon’s Historic Columbia River Highway State Trail is a breathtaking pathway east of Portland that Rizzo visited a few years ago at the behest of cycling advocates who had been working for nearly 30 years to get a 40-foot-high stone stairway converted into a wheel-friendly ramp. The moss-covered stairs—the only route through a section of the trail—were constructed a full six years after the passage of the federal Americans with Disabilities Act prohibited such things.
Rizzo’s star power was enlisted to bring attention to the barrier, and while she’s quick to decline sole credit for moving things forward, the state legislature set aside $400,000 for an engineering and remediation study after her visit.
On a Role Along the Advocacy Path
It wasn’t long after arriving in Washington, D.C., for a new job with a federal agency that a fellow disability rights advocate asked Rizzo if she’d ever considered competing for Ms. Wheelchair Maryland. “It wasn’t a beauty pageant,” she explained, “but an empowerment pageant for women leaders.” With a background in communications, Rizzo had previously helped to run the Ms. Wheelchair Texas program, but admitted she’d never considered competing herself.
While she didn’t win the title the first year she entered, she did the following year and was crowned Ms. Wheelchair America the year after that. Along with her outside work as the communications director for the office of Judith Heumann, widely regarded as the mother of the disability rights movement, Rizzo credits her time as Ms. Wheelchair America with helping her learn “to work proactively with allies, advocates and other organizations to elevate what people with disabilities need. It was a way for me to help ensure that our community is seen and valued.”
Rizzo’s role in advocacy work grew to the point where, outside of her day job, she was giving keynote addresses at pedestrian summits, performing accessibility audits of cities around the country and even a campground—“I’d never seen a fully accessible campground before!” she laughed. Her work was elevated in print, radio and TV appearances, and she was also called upon by U.S. surgeons general across two presidential administrations to champion the health and wellness of those with disabilities, and then to promote walkable communities where she introduced what she jokingly called her trademark phrase: walkability, rollability—possibility.
It’s a turn of phrase that captures much of what Rizzo tries to accomplish. “Years ago, there was a reduced possibility of someone like me being able to fully access a trail,” she said, recounting what she called her “first major foray into the great outdoors.” Colleagues had invited her to Cadillac Mountain in Maine to watch the sunset, and “I was excited to be invited, but I really didn’t anticipate the accessibility barriers because I had never been asked to do something like this.” While the hike to the top isn’t considered terribly difficult, Rizzo found there was no way she could make the journey with the group.
Upon being driven to the top, Rizzo said she “decided I would be adventurous and try to navigate out to the summit [overlook].” With the benefit of daylight, Rizzo was able to gingerly pick out a path across the rough terrain, “but as the sun went down, I realized there was no clear return path. At that point it was just all rocks, so I had to ask for help to push my scooter back.” But today, a paved summit loop trail circles the top, Rizzo noted. “That is possibility.”
A National Voice
Rizzo joined RTC’s board in 2021 and said that many times people with disabilities are on the receiving end of an organization’s mission and not in a position to help drive its work forward. But on the board, Rizzo offers up her lived experience on equitable access to trails and provides input on RTC’s philanthropic and communications efforts as well. One of her cherished contributions to the board is supporting RTC’s Celebrate Trails Day, an annual springtime celebration of trails nationwide. Having attended and supported events across the country, she said one of her favorites was helping to build an all-accessible event on the Chester Valley Trail in Pennsylvania, part of the Circuit Trails, a developing 800-mile trail network in the Greater Philadelphia area.
“I worked with local leadership and county commissioners on a proclamation to promote Celebrate Trails Day, and they came out to support the event,” she said. “We had exhibitors offering equipment demos on all sorts of adaptive recreation.”
Reflecting on her work with RTC, Rizzo said the organization “has given me more access than I’ve ever had to the great outdoors. I hope my advocacy work with the board gives others a taste of what’s truly possible.”
This article will be published in the upcoming Fall 2026 issue of Rails to Trails magazine and has been reposted here in an edited format. Subscribe to read more articles about remarkable trails while also supporting our work.
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