New DART Improved Accessibility Pilot

[Thomas J Stamp]

the initiative has already broken down - as Colm pointed out (and was covered in the media the next day) it didnt even work at the launch as wheelchair users were left stranded on the train. I'd be carpeting the PR guy for that one (Hi Barry x).

it is longstanding RUI policy that all trains and stations are fully accessible, it is simply degrading to ring up 24, 4 or even 1 hour in advance. it doesn't need massive amounts of money. You can put the current hand deployed ramp on every DART and ensure the driver and destination station knows it will need to be deployed on arrival. On launch day the destination station wasn't told of the user on board (which is as amazing as it seems) as apparently, someone forgot. We have been told of this happening since.

But, you know, we don't have fully staffed stations and having the driver get out of the cab to deploy the ramp takes time and so on and so on. These are excuses and easily solved. It's very similar to the quiet carriages thing. Its too much effort to enforce so sod it. The wheelchair users are likewise too much effort, it seems.