On June 14 Dr John Gill, RNIB's chief scientist, chaired a conference on the question: 'How can developments in mainstream transport technology help visually impaired passengers"' Dr Fred Reid presented 'a blind consumer's view'. This is a version of it.
Many of the assistance services introduced recently for blind and partially sighted travellers have partly failed because providers did not think through how they would operate in real life. Consequently some consumers here have voiced sceptical comments concerning the benefits they will derive from up-coming projects: smart card ticketing, customer personalised machines, global positioning systems, etc. This reflects frustration we all feel about the inconsistency of transport assistance. Too often delivery fails. There is a postcode lottery about it and many physical barriers remain.
I do not deny that progress has been real. Escort services are valuable and on-board train announcements reassuring. Yet we all know that assistance is not always what it was meant to be.
I offer here some illustrations from my own experience, beginning with recent design failures. The new Virgin 'Voyager' trains have signs in braille and raised roman type on the toilet doors. Unfortunately neither informs the passenger that the button which opens the door is not located on it, but on a wall at right angles to it. I would never have discovered this location if a member of the crew had not spotted me sweeping the door, vainly searching for a handle.
Also very difficult are the doors connecting the carriages. These are opened electrically by pressing a disc, but the disc is located on a different surface on each of the four doorways that have to be opened to pass from one carriage to the next. This sequence is hard to remember.
Turning to human services and associated technologies, we welcome regular, standardised, on-board announcements. They give vital information: the final destination of the train (announced before leaving the station!); the next stop on the journey, the opening and closing of the train shop. Unfortunately, in my experience about one third of these announcements are completely inaudible. This is not always due to technological failure. Often one crew member will make audible announcements while, on the same train, the next will mumble inaudibly into the microphone. Too many trains have no announcements - merely a screen in the carriage. When I pointed this out recently, the train manager promised the driver would announce the stops, but he never did.
We should consider why such failures happen. Every provider here has insisted that they have consulted disabled people intensively. I have been hearing this for years. So why do failures of design occur? Is the consultation process too bureaucratic or too perfunctory? Is it (perish the thought) that companies believe they are fulfilling their corporate obligations if they do something for the disabled, not concerning themselves overmuch about how it really works?
Some colour is given to such scepticism by the services offered to passengers at large, without any attempt to make them accessible to blind and partially sighted people. Announcements exhort passengers to read the safety advice provided in print. I have never been offered this information in accessible format -- braille or audio-cassette. Contrast some airlines, which provide this.
Another glaring example is the unstaffed railway station. Blind and partially sighted people are furious at the attitude that leaves them to cope without assistance or else go farther on to a station that is staffed. If stations really must be unstaffed, I would advise companies to think of alternative solutions. RNIB has suggested travelling assistants. Another solution could be copied from the Tokyo underground. Every platform on that system has a groove, about one inch deep and one inch wide, which runs down the middle to the stairs and continues all the way to the exit. A blind traveller can simply push the tip of their cane into the groove and safely exit the station.
Personal assistance by the on-board staff is of great value, but delivery is inconsistent. Some train managers are very attentive and will phone ahead to inform the destination station of my coach and seat position. Sometimes they will ask if I need anything from the shop and shop staff will come along to provide refreshments to order. But all this is unusual, as it is for staff to help when my journey is aborted. An announcement instructs everyone to change trains, but nobody comes to help me with the task.
Perhaps there is simply not enough on-board staff. This is suggested by the fact that I get more personal attention when travelling first class. Some consideration, therefore, needs to be given to level of on-board staffing. There should also be a way of requesting the presence of staff at one's seat. Could mobile phones be used for this instead of re-wiring trains?
I turn briefly to buses and the urban environment. Compared to modern railways, urban bus services notoriously lack 'real time' information. Perhaps drivers should not be expected to announce stops. One bus driver replied when asked to provide announcements: "I only work along this route, lady. I don't ruddy well live on it." So when are we going to get recorded announcements, which are provided so often on the continent. New technologies like talking bus stops and talking timetables are gradually coming in, but at a glacially slow pace!
Often we have to walk to the railway station or bus stop. The increasing hostility of the street environment is alarming. This is the main reason why some sixty percent of older blind and partially sighted people say they never go out unescorted.
We have been campaigning for more than thirty years to make streets safer. We have demanded that posts be sited in safer positions. Temporary obstructions on the pavement should be banned, we cry. And as for vehicles parked on the pavement, why the drivers ought to be run out of town to the nearest jail!
Yet our vociferous protests have fallen mostly on deaf ears. Many city and town centre streets are virtually impassable by blind and partially sighted pedestrians.
We all know, if we really think about it, why this is so. Most obstructions simply have to be where they are. Shopkeepers have to display their wares outside or lose out to competition. Parking on the pavement is often the only reasonable solution for the driver.
So what should we demand? I suggest here that we are desperately in need of some new thinking to offer town planners and highway authorities. Instead of demanding the re-siting of fixed obstructions like posts, why not demand that they be clad in soft material up to, say, seven feet above ground level? Scaffolding companies are already showing the way. Is there any reason not to clad all metal columns?
Instead of using sharp-edged steel to construct street furniture such as pillar boxes, litter bins, etc., why not make them of plastic, with no corners. Such litter receptacles already exist. I would not say they are a joy to bump against, but at least they do not cut you open.
The sign on the A-board -- that dreaded stumbling block -- should be mounted on the wall above head height. Shopkeepers should be forbidden to display wares on the pavement unless they protect us by a secure fence, like road works should be. We will know that we have made real progress with these problems when we can say that an Englishman's street is his bouncy castle.
What is wrong with our old thinking is that it seems to want every obstruction cleared out of the way. This is impracticable, and the principle I am advocating is safe sharing of the streets. Some temporary obstacles on the pavement are necessary, such as signs to warn motorists of roadworks. Such obstructions can easily be made audible. Blind people may hate me for saying that parking on the pavement is often reasonable. But would such cars be so hateful if vehicle manufacturers provided an audible warning signal which the driver could switch on when it is necessary to park on a pedestrian area -- just as many vehicles now have audible reverse warning signals.
To conclude, this excellent conference has allowed us to look ahead at new technologies that are under development in the transport industry. I congratulate providers on giving thought to access issues. They should take warning, however, from the inadequacy of some recent innovations. Although well-intended and partially successful, they have too often failed to deliver their full potential because such issues as design and training have not been fully thought through.
Blind and partially sighted people who are striving for absolute accessibility through technology should also take caution. If we always insist on perfection we may fail to gain desirable improvements. Pavements cannot be made obstruction free. Devices cannot be created which will simply announce their presence when we think we need them. That is the world of Hogwarts Castle, not King's Cross station.
NOTE: this article appeared in New Beacon, Oct. 2004. New Beacon is a publication of the Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB). For RNIB go to www.rnib.org.uk