Guide Dogs discovers the Forgotten Passengers
30 Jan 2012
Blind bus passengers are being left stranded and vulnerable, suggests a new survey by Guide Dogs.
Nearly nine out of ten passengers (87%) with sight loss who took part in the survey had missed their stop because they didn’t know where they were on a bus journey. Despite asking a bus driver to tell them where to get off, nearly nine out of ten (87%) visually impaired respondents say they have missed their stop because the driver had forgotten to tell them.
Guide dog owner Andy Parkinson, from Nantwich, is a nurse and spends three hours a day commuting. He said: “Drivers can often be patronising and impatient, they regularly forget to let me know when we’ve reached my stop. There have been times I have ended up back at the depot or in unknown parts of town, not knowing where I was or how to get home."
David Cowdrey, Campaigns Manager at Guide Dogs, said: “Some of the stories that survey respondents told us were awful, including one lady who was almost locked in a bus in a depot for the night because the driver forgot she was there. People are ending up lost or left in potentially dangerous situations because they can’t get the information they need about their bus journeys.”
Nearly 300 people took part in the survey, called Forgotten Passengers, which explores the issues they face when using buses. Worryingly, we found that 29% of visually impaired respondents said that a driver had refused to alert them to their stop.
Our Talking Buses campaign is lobbying for audio-visual announcements on board buses to help everyone, not just blind and partially sighted people. We want all buses to have information telling passengers the next stop and the final destination, much like trains.
We want:
- National government to amend the Public Service Vehicle Accessibility Regulations to make audio-visual systems compulsory.
- Until then, local government and bus operators to make their buses more accessible for blind and partially sighted people, including providing audio-visual announcements, by bidding for the Government's £50million Better Bus Areas fund.
David Cowdrey added: "It doesn't matter to us whether the audio-visual information comes through state-of-the-art sound systems and LCD televisions, or the driver simply announces the next stop and holds up a sign. We believe it should be easy for everyone to know where they are along a bus route."
