Jerusalem
I didn't have room to finish all I wanted to say at Harvest and this is to fill some gaps which were left then. The Disability Discrimination Act helps people with hearing difficulties ranging from written information, speech-to-text transcription service, induction loop systems, subtitles, videos with BSL (British Sign Language) interpretation, computer screen displays, textphones, telephone amplifiers and inductive couplers, audio visual telephones, audio visual fire alarms, to qualified BSL interpreters.
People
with visual impairment are similarly catered for in that there is a menu of
services available, but not all will be enforced in all
buildings: Readers, large or clear print, Moon or Braille,
computer information, audiotape information, spoken announcements or verbal
communication, assistance with guiding, audiodescription services, large print
or tactile maps / plans and 3D models, touch facilities e.g. interactive exhibits
in museums.
I will now tell you about Wheelchair Assistance which can be booked at airports and train stations. As I said last time, we take a wheelchair if we are venturing from home without the car. This enables us to go long walks and see places I could not physically reach under my own steam. Wheelchair assistance needs to be requested when you book your air ticket, or if you have a health flare-up just prior to departure and you therefore need a wheelchair unexpectedly; contact the carrier or travel agent as soon as is possible.
You can either take your own wheelchair or use one owned
by the airport. If you are a lone traveller, someone will come to the check-in
desk and escort you through the screening section and get you into the departure
lounge. I assume, but do not know for certain, that if you contact the airport
or travel agent, provision would be made to escort you from a taxi, because
luggage in addition to a wheelchair is a problem. It is slightly different
for a
couple travelling together as there is an extra pair of hands to ease the
mobility problems.
In most airports someone from the firm servicing the plane
will come and push you, via the x-ray machines and then to the departure lounge.
Phil and I do not require any more assistance until it is boarding time. The
disabled herd
are then rounded up
at a specific place. At this
point again airport staff take you, or at least escort a couple with others,
to
the gate, rather like a bizarre mechanical crocodile. There are now stiff
security procedures to follow and passengers are tightly supervised; wheelchairs
are usually pushed only by airport employees on the tarmac of the airport.
People with disabilities and parents with pushchairs are
boarded first as they obviously take more time to settle. If the plane is
entered by steps, wheelchair users travel in an ambulift. The wheelchair enters
a cabin via a lift (like those used in delivery vans unloading heavy items)
and
then the chair is strapped down and your partner is seat-belted in. This vehicle
has the facility to lift the cabin to the door of the plane opposite the front
entrance used by other passengers. You then get to your seat from flat access
and the wheelchairs are whisked away. In our case Speedy Gonzalez
(the
wheelchair) is put in the hold, and if you don't own a wheelchair, the airport
chair is taken away. If you are lucky enough to be at an airport with air bridge
access to the plane, you are just wheeled to the aircraft door.
It is advisable to check with a stewardess on the flight to make sure they will expect wheelchairs at the destination airport. Again the responsibility for transport from the plane to the luggage carousel, through passport control, seems to be with the handling company and wheelchairs are seen to last of all. Many a time we by-pass the normal system and get to the carousel at the same time as our fellow passengers.
I
am always so pleased to see my wheelchair when we arrive and just dread seeing
it in a mangled state. I read a disabled magazine which prints some horror
stories about very expensive treasured wheelchairs arriving in an unworkable
state. It is heartbreaking to read these stories. I can walk and drive, but
if I
didn't I would be even more anxious about the state of Speedy Gonzalez at our
destination.
Virgin Trains are extremely good with wheelchair assistance and offering help to people who have walking difficulties. You need to book this service 24 hours beforehand. At the same time as booking, you will be told a rendezvous time to meet the Virgin representative, well in advance of the time the train is due to arrive.
We recently went down to London to start our holiday. The taxi driver took our luggage inside Preston station and Phil pushed me in afterwards. I'd just put the brakes on and, genie-like, a red-coated Virgin man appeared and I was whisked off to the platform. He waited around until the train came, produced two steel ramps, pushed me on board and parked the wheelchair out of the way. He also helped Phil with the cases, which were quite large as we were setting out for a two-week holiday. At Euston, we just descended from the train and a buggy arrived which gobbled us up, with the wheelchair and cases, and sped us, light flashing, to the taxi rank. We got a taxi and were off literally within minutes of arriving at the station. We travelled down to Italy on several trains and I can honestly say Virgin matched up well to the service of these other companies in Germany, France, Austria and Italy and they often surpassed them. I haven't done a lot of research about wheelchair assistance abroad; we were with a group of 40 people and I didn't need it this time. I do know that Italy has a service to help disabled people and in Germany I was swooped on straight away as I waited at a platform.
Travelling with a wheelchair can be tiring, but I don't
want to stop doing things because I can't walk far. We both take the strain,
so to speak, and I have the gypsy in my soul. Have Speedy
, will travel!
© Fulwood Methodist Church
16:10:59 Wednesday, 26 October 2005
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