DfT» have started
a new consultation on "Design standards for accessible railway stations: a code of practice". At first sight this means there is a new version of this document, but in fact they are consulting on the existing one (V04 March 2015) in the context of other existing standards and policy statements. (There are links to those and the code itself in the page cited above.)
There's a lot of words, too many to quote
in extenso, but here's a couple is paragraphs from the announcement:
This consultation will seek to understand the impact of existing accessibility standards, determine what more needs to be done to improve rail accessibility for all users on mainline railway stations across Great Britain and reducing the ambiguity for those in the industry working on station infrastructure improvements. The revision looks to reduce ambiguity and simplify the standards set out in the code of practice to continue protecting the interests of all railway passengers when accessing stations. This includes ensuring the cost associated with changes to infrastructure is in line with achieving best value whilst managing public money.
In addition to the standards in the code, as part of their operating licence, passenger train and station operators, including Network Rail are required to establish and comply with an accessible travel policy (ATP▸ ). This will state how they will protect the interests of disabled users of their trains and stations. It also commits the operator to meeting their legal obligations in terms of making reasonable adjustments to their services to allow disabled people to use them. For example, by providing an accessible taxi, free of charge, to anyone unable to access a particular station.
Of course we are now primed by events to ask what al this verbiage says about ticket offices. Ther are a few pages about the design of TOs, and
TVMs▸ , but I can't see anything setting why they matter. If the very existence of people selling tickets can no longer be assumed, what needs do they meet and can these be defined? That would allow the alternatives (whatever they are) to be assessed against an agreed requirement.
One impression I get (the code alone is 250 pages, and the other sources not much lighter) is that all this concern is weighted towards
PRM▸ , rather than PRAT (people with restricted access to ticketing). If you do look at any of this, you may see why I said (in this thread, I think) that one of the
TOCs▸ ' motivations for redeploying ticket sellers to other support duties, mainly on platforms, was that they are still far short of the level of PRM support being asked of them by DfT. So are they robbing Peter PRAT to pay Paul PRM?
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Poll
