[nfb-talk] Need Advice: Transit District Schedule Accessibility

[Jess]

Lloyd and all,
I know that the Capital District Transportation Authority actually doesn't 
have a trip planner on their website any longer instead what they do is use 
google maps instead to allow you do plan your trips.
Jessica
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Lloyd Rasmussen" <lras at sprynet.com>
To: "'NFB Talk Mailing List'" <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Tuesday, September 08, 2009 9:18 PM
Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] Need Advice: Transit District Schedule Accessibility


>I think you are in a fairly small community.  Washington Metro
>  www.wmata.com
> has a trip planner on the web which is accessible, and the same system 
> feeds
> a telephone-based voice in/voice out system that helps you plan routes at
> specified times.  Getting info about specific stops is probably best 
> handled
> by humans during the hours they are on duty, provided that they have been
> given some detailed maps and a little training.
>
> In a moderate-sized community, the web-based table approach Yasmin 
> mentioned
> for Montgomery County Ride-On is probably the best option.
>
> At Services for the Visually Impaired, the agency Judy used to run, we set
> up an elaborate system for getting the Washington Metro's database output
> into the Duxbury Braille translator, transposing rows and columns.  So for
> each major stop, we gave a list of the times that a bus passed that stop 
> in
> a given direction.  We could emboss braille bus schedules on demand. 
> There
> never was that much demand for our braille schedules, so the service is no
> longer offered.  It was an interesting project while it lasted, and it 
> cost
> about $1,500 of a programmer's time to develop it.
>
>
> Lloyd Rasmussen, Kensington, Maryland
> Home:  http://lras.home.sprynet.com
> Work:  http://www.loc.gov/nls
> www.facebook.com/lloyd.rasmussen
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: nfb-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nfb-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
>> Behalf Of Tina Hansen
>> Sent: Tuesday, September 08, 2009 2:29 AM
>> To: nfb-talk at nfbnet.org
>> Subject: [nfb-talk] Need Advice: Transit District Schedule Accessibility
>>
>> In my area, our transit system has undergone a massive redesign, the 
>> first
>> in 30 years. With this comes new schedules. Unfortunately, the web-based
>> schedules are in PDF format only. While I know that there have been
>> attempts to make these documents accessible, it's not always easy. There
>> are also maps of the new routes, and those are not easy for screen 
>> readers
>> to cope with.
>>
>> Given this issue, I'd like to hear what others have done or are doing to
>> ensure that these transit schedules are accessible. I have thought about
>> Braille and/or audio schedules, and I'd love to work with the transit
>> district, but I don't know where to begin. I have also thought about the
>> Customer Service line, but that only works when the center is open; it
>> doesn't work after hours. What about automated schedule phone lines?
>>
>> Given what's happening, does anyone out there have any suggestions on how
>> I can work with the transit district to guide them in offering truly
>> accessible bus schedules? What can I do to help them offer good
>> descriptions of  where the routes stop? If you've done something with 
>> your
>> local transit district, what did you come up with? If you have any
>> suggestions, I'd be interested in hearing them. Thanks.
>> _______________________________________________
>
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