On the 4th of October Generate Voices went to the Learning Disability Transport Forum.
The group had an extraordinary day as we traveled from Clapham Junction station to London Waterloo where Sean came in from Queenstown Road.
We took the Jubilee Line together to Southwark and entered the building just in time before the meeting kicked off at 11am.
The topic of the Transport Forum is buses everyone who attended got to say their views positive and negative impacts of London buses in different boroughs of London.
We were split onto two different tables Malachi and Leon were on a table with one group.
Terry, Karen and Sean were on the other.
We were all asked how we traveled to the office and most people said bus and everyone else came by train,bus and tube.
The bus focus group went up and spoke about buses on diversions and some drivers don’t use the announcement system to tell passengers which way they are going and why the bus is on diversion.
Terry shared his experience of buses on diversion “I had the experience of being on buses that are on diversion the G1 for example now buses have to serve at stops that they pass on their diverted route when I pressed the bell hoping the bus would stop at Summerstown but he didn’t he drove straight past it carrying on the Wimbledon Road. Another diversion I experienced recently was on the 77 bus this time instead of going to Earlsfield Road the ibus said This bus is on diversion please listen for further announcements. The driver didn’t use the system to make the announcement he drove down towards Wansdworth Southside serving stops along the way that was my experience with buses on diversion”
Many attendees thought of good ideas to help improve bus driver training and help the drivers to understand people with learning disabilities & autism.
For example someone brought up bus drivers always drive off impatiently and not waiting for someone to sit down which was a good point as many of us experienced some bus drivers drive off very fast not giving anyone a chance to sit down.
Malachi asked about the ibus system on Rail Replacement buses one of the bus team said when ibus 2 gets released it will serve on rail replacement services. as the current ibus doesn’t announce for these services.
Leon said “On buses how do you work round on the notice board that says do not speak to the driver” that was a good point to ask. as the same member of the bus team said Drivers can speak to passengers when the bus is not moving but cannot speak to passengers while its moving.
After lunch we started discussions on writing down our ideas to Transport For London (TFL) Sean written his view down on a sticky note and placed it on the large sheet of paper that was given out to all tables.
Karen had help from Kate writing down her views on a sticky note.
During the discussion many subjects were passed around with positives and negatives.
At the end of the session Terry, Karen, Sean and Leon traveled back to Clapham Junction together. The group enjoyed the Learning Disability Transport Forum and are looking forward to the next meeting in February.
Thank you Bild, People First and Transport For London for having us at the TFL Offices we will look forward to meeting up again at other meetings.
If you require any information about your local transport areas in London visit the TFL website.