Article: RailCorp discriminates against blind, court finds

[ozbob]

From the Sydney Morning Herald click here!

RailCorp discriminates against blind, court finds

RailCorp discriminates against blind, court finds
February 1, 2013 - 12:09PM
Paul Bibby

The NSW rail system discriminates against blind and visually impaired passengers by failing to consistently tell them which station their train has reached, a court has found.

Federal Disability Discrimination Commissioner Graeme Innes has won his 18-month discrimination battle against RailCorp, with a federal magistrate finding that the state-run corporation's station announcement system was "haphazard and uncoordinated".

"It would appear startlingly obvious to the lay observer that passengers travelling upon trains need to know where to get off," Federal Magistrate Kenneth Raphael said.

"It would be equally obvious that this information would be provided in a way that was effective for all passengers."

"If not, the lay observer would conclude that those passengers ... were being discriminated against."

He found that Mr Innes had been indirectly discriminated against as defined by the Commonwealth Disability Discrimination Act, awarding him $10,000 in compensation.

Mr Innes' claim was based on 35 train trips he made between March and September 2011, in which there were no announcements, or they were infrequent or inaudible.

In about one-third of cases, the announcement system was faulty and the fault had already been reported.

Speaking outside court, a jubilant Mr Innes said he looked forward to RailCorp "accepting the umpire's decision and working with me to make sure that everyone is told where they are".

"I offered to work with RailCorp many times to ensure that blind and vision-impaired people are treated just like everyone else, but they didn't want to do it, they wanted to have the legal argument. I look forward to them now taking the steps that are needed."

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/railcorp-discriminates-against-blind-court-finds-20130201-2dooa.html

[SurfRail]

Brought to you by the same pennypinching idiots who ensured that Tangaras have no destination displays (except for the one on T69 I think which is permanently set to "DAPTO") and that the refurbishments do not include internal display screens...

[achiruel]

What about buses?

Very few buses have audio announcements regarding next stop etc, except for recently it seems a fair few of the LCBS fleet has been fitted.

[somebody]

What about buses?

Very few buses have audio announcements regarding next stop etc, except for recently it seems a fair few of the LCBS fleet has been fitted.

Just ask the driver when you get on.

[#Metro]

Standard in Toronto 

[boxe]

Sydney's first Internal Destination Indicators (IDI) were on the Millennium trains which came out in service 2000, and then again 2002 after troubles. I'm sure IDIs existed elsewhere in the world before this, the 'latest' phone model was out somewhere a few months ago, the current films were already showing in cinemas somewhere else and Fibre Internet is nothing new.

[SurfRail]

^ The difference between every other metropolitan system in Australia and Sydney is that we've all been refitting PIDS inside our trains.  I suspect every Melbourne train has them except the Hitachis - every Perth train does and probably all the 3000s/3100s in Adelaide.  The only trains without them up here are the EMUs which are yet to go in to have them installed.

Our buses will also have PIDS as standard in a couple of years.  Logan is already 100% done.

[petey3801]

The only trains without them up here are the EMUs which are yet to go in to have them installed.

Slight nit-pick here, but most of the EMUs have had PIDs installed now, it's only really the EMUs in the 50-59 range and a few 60-series ones to go now.

[SurfRail]

The only trains without them up here are the EMUs which are yet to go in to have them installed.

Slight nit-pick here, but most of the EMUs have had PIDs installed now, it's only really the EMUs in the 50-59 range and a few 60-series ones to go now.

Quite correct, and I should have included the ICEs too (which fall into the same category as Hitachis/2000 classes etc - old things of which there aren't enough to justify the work and which will probably be the next things to go).