Obama the pony is helping Glasgow become more inclusive as his owner Simon Mulholland introduces a way to make grass, beaches and rocks wheelchair accessible.

Simon, 64, of Pony Axe S offers horse-drawn rides in an innovative three-wheel vehicle with space for a wheelchair.

He has had a vision of bringing ponies back into mainstream communities since he started building pony powered vehicles 20 years ago.

He said: “It is about access. Oddly enough, this isn’t really a pony activity, it is an access activity.

“If somebody wanted to go bird watching or anything, I don’t care, they want to go and do something and they can’t get there.”

“I can get them there and that’s what it is about.”

He emphasised that his pony drawn vehicle is not a “disabled activity” yet an “inclusive activity”.

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Simon moved to Paisley a year and a half ago and has been working with organisations in Glasgow ever since and plans on getting Pony Axe S more established in the city.

Since then he has taken people to 40 different beaches in Scotland.

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In England, he struggled to provide the accessible pony-drawn service after countryside organisations were not open to his idea and were “not prepared to speak to him”.

He visited Scotland in 2017 and worked with charity PAMIS and took people in wheelchairs around Pollok Park on April 2 2017.

“I discovered a civilised country and have been Scottish ever since,” the 64-year-old said.

The Scottish Outdoor Access Code is greatly to thank for the acceptance of Simon’s idea for promoting accessibility to beaches and grassy areas.

Simon added: “Everyone in Scotland says ‘oh wow, how can we help’.

Simon cares about the experience being safe, which is not an easy task.

He said: “Ponies and horses if they are scared they bolt. There wouldn’t be a word for it if it wasn’t something they did quite a lot and you can’t stop them bolting.”

If someone is tied into the vehicle and the horse is frightened the vehicle could tip over and injure the person within the vehicle.

He added: “I am a coward and I build vehicles because I want to come back in one piece back undamaged.

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“Being a coward, I am scared of horses and I am scared of getting hurt so I needed to find a way to detach the vehicle quickly.”

After getting into an accident with a bolting horse in 2005, inspiration struck and Simon invented an instant pony release system.

He has since been working with the GalGael trust in Glasgow on perfecting the system and to fully automate the safety of the vehicles.

“If it is an automated system - like the airbag on your car - you don’t have to be intelligent, you don’t have to be clever, it is there - you are safe,” he added.

“That’s the kind of technology that I want so that the vehicle basically can’t hurt the person sitting in it.”

Safety is such an important concern for the 64-year-old he tests out the vehicle in the more extreme environments.

Simon takes the carriage led by Obama the pony from GalGael in Ibrox to Glasgow which reassures him that everything will be okay in more controlled conditions such as in the Glasgow Green.

“I do these goofy things, partly because it amuses me, partly because it is a very good test run to see if all systems are working.”

It also helps Obama, who has been a part of Simon's family since 2009, get used to different conditions.

The 64-year-old added: “He was black and white, which I thought was the least relevant thing about him, so he became Obama.”

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Simon and Obama have been working with Glasgow cycling charity Free Wheel North that provide accessible bicycles.

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He is hoping to rebrand the initiative WeeGeeGeeAccess to become more Glasgow focused as he feels at home in this city.

“The nice thing about Glasgow is that it is just such a friendly place. I feel at home,” he said.

Simon referred to himself as the "pony wing" of the cycling charity and plans on fundraising with the help of the audited charity.

But his ambitions are bigger than that, he said: "What we want to do is really get this going worldwide because if you are in a wheelchair you don’t go on the beach. It seems to me that if we can make it work in Glasgow it becomes a model.