A visitor at John Dillon Park, a fully adaptive network of trails with campsites and recreational offerings near Long Lake in the Adirondack Park. (Skip Dickstein, Times Union archive)

A little less than half of the Adirondack Park's 2.6 million acres of forest preserve is categorized as wilderness — as in "forever wild," the sweeping phrase that defines the intent of keeping so much natural beauty away from the tender mercies of development and other forms of human exploitation.

What that means, in part, is that there will likely never be a funicular train clattering up the side of Mount Marcy, or a Starbucks conveniently located on the summit of Cascade Mountain.

For New Yorkers and other visitors to the park who live with disabilities that make hiking difficult or even impossible, it means their access is limited to designated areas, such as the growing number of sites designed specifically to accommodate........

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