Authors

Joël Gauthier

Document Type

Conference Paper

Publication Date

6-2010

Subject Area

Transport accessibility - Access to services, Transport accessibility - Access to Information, Transport planning - Accessibility planning, Mobility - Accessibility Planning (Disability), Modes of Transport - Bus, Modes of Transport - Train

Abstract

The mission of the Agence métropolitaine de transport (AMT) is to expand public transit services in order to improve the efficiency of individual travel in the metropolitan area of Montreal. The AMT participates actively in promoting intermodality between the different transit corporations and the various transportation modes of its territory, which includes over 83 municipalities. In a bid to form part of a comprehensive national and North American vision, the AMT bases its actions plan on a triennial base, with four major orientations: access to communications, infrastructure, rolling stock and the human factor (training and sensitization). The objective is to prioritize actions to make a regular transit system accessible, while accounting for the four basic orientations and various environmental constraints, particularly as related to the railway context. For this purpose, the AMT has produced a comprehensive picture of the greater metropolitan region, including several sociodemographic indicators, with the aim of focusing reflection on solutions to improve access to the transit system. Access to the regular transit system is the first link in the chain to allow social, educational and professional integration of people with limited mobility. Defining coherent standards within the different environmental constraints, in relation to the importance of intermodality and the users’ needs, is an exercise requiring an integrated, structured, concerted approach, as shown in the action plan. The recent purchase of new, accessible train cars genuinely reflects this approach. Representatives of different paratransit user groups joined the AMT team on a trip to Plattsburgh, in upstate New York, to view the cars and make their recommendations with the goal of meeting users’ needs. Their concrete participation on that U.S. trip greatly influenced certain changes subsequently made to the cars, particularly the fact of increasing the number of places available for wheelchair users. These same cars will serve certain train lines running to Central Station, adjacent to the Downtown Terminus, which is currently undergoing work with the aim of making it accessible. All these actions coordinated around this key modal transfer point on the Island of Montreal let us make the trip easier for all commuters, including people with reduced mobility and handicapped persons. There is good reason to believe that the AMT’s actions further to the prioritization approach it defined in its action plan serve to streamline the various mass transit modes in the greater metropolitan region and that the AMT plays an undeniable role in influencing the supply and the quality of the service offered to people with reduced mobility and handicapped persons. For the AMT, concerted action with the partners and the handicapped community is crucial, not only to offer suitable adapted service at a low cost, but especially to reduce barriers in order to give everyone a fairer chance of participating fully in society.

Rights

Permission to publish the abstract has been given by TRANSED 2010, copyright remains with them.