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Paralympian forced to wet herself on train without accessible toilet
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Because toilets that lock themselves out of use at the drop of a hat are no use to anyone, paralympian or not.
But I don't understand what your preferred flushing mechanism (personally I do not have a preference in this field, but each to their own!) or Northern trains have to do with either the incident in this thread or the legislation that you started complaining about.
I don't recall complaining about any legislation ? The point is, you can have a fully accessible flush toilet whilst meeting the legislation. The difference is you can still use a flush loo, even if they've not filled the cistern tank and its not flushing, whereas the slightest sign of trouble, these vacuum ones are locked out.
Good for her. This is one of those things that should never, ever be allowed to happen - especially not to a paying customer.
I once boarded a train at Gatwick Airport. It was a Reading bound train. I knew I'd need the loo but I didn't have to go right then. Eventually train departed and I went to find the loo. It was locked. So was the other. I mentioned it to guard who seemed to act as if they already knew. If they did, they could have at least told us in advance. They didn't sound to bothered by the situation.
I decided to hold on until Guildford rather than wait another hour for the next train, this being the evening. It was uncomfortable but I made it at least.
Now I can use any toilet that has a loo seat on it but I have health stuff which means I do sometimes need the loo suddenly.
As much as I love the snow I would probably struggle if a train was stranded for 4 hours and none of the loos could be used.
PHILIPE
Veteran Member
One of the Cardiff to Portsmouth sets did 2 round trips today without a toilet
I wouldn't say trains should be taken out of service without a loo but I do think all new rolling stock should be built with one.
If u am on a train without a loo then I am more careful with eating and drinking to the point where I might even do neither.
All new rolling stock has to be accessible to wheelchairs so why should people with other disabilities also not have enhancements to help them? I'm using the disability classification one would use for work. I wouldn't consider myself disabled but for the purposes to extra provisions at work I would be.
Of course at what point do you stop doing things to help people with disabilities.
At least South Western Railway are going to put toilets into all their trains in the future. That is a very good move.
Llanigraham
On Moderation
If the toilet tank is full, the loo will lock out of use.
If the toilet is blocked, it will be locked out of use.
If the loo will not flush then it will be locked out of use.
If the loo is damaged it will be locked out of use.
What do you expect them to do?
And if you haven't realised it loos that "dump" on the tracks are now being phased out since they are a health hazard and illegal in all new trains.
MarlowDonkey
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London Transport trains have never offered these and those on National Rail offering similar services, London Overground and Crossrail for example, don't either. That's a downgrade for travellers between Paddington and Reading once many or most of the services are Elizabeth Line. The theory is that stops and services are frequent enough that you use a station.
A confidential payout. I suspect a deal was done to keep this out of court. It's likely the rail industry were running scared of a legal precedent.
It was interesting to go back through this thread and read some of the victim blaming and rail industry apologist posts. It is indeed the case that this should never have happened. And it is indeed the case that the fault lies entirely with the TOC and its staff.
Mark 4's and some 158's have flush lavatories with retention tanks.
maire23
Member
I’m frankly not surprised it was CrossCountry. I’ve mentioned on another thread the issues I’ve had with them and I think they just make it as it difficult as possible for disabled people to travel!!!!
nottsnurse
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You're joking right?
I'm lucky enough not to regularly need to travel on Cross Country services, but whilst waiting at Leicester for my usual EMT service to Nottingham I see just how rammed the Birmingham/Cambridge services are.
It's pretty disgusting that an inter-regional service that serves so many popular destinations gets such short shrift with the choice of stock, but it seems minimal effort is the policy of Cross Country.
Mark 4s can best be described as having 'retention' tanks. When they get full they spill over, particularly when going around corners.
Many people who go lineside react/shield themselves much more to a Mark 4 set going past than a traditional tankless train. I have heard said 'if an HST goes past and someone pulls the chain you get that one person's dooings, if its a Mark 4 you may well get some from everyone onboard!'
Well, as with vacuum toilets they need to empty them more often.
However, there seems to be a lot more that can go wrong on a vacuum toilet and they get locked out more readily.
I hope I'm proved wrong, however I don't hold out much hope that these toilets will be serviced adequately, particularly where you have a single unit with on toilet.
Infact, I've already had my fingers burnt with a retrofitted one on a 156 gone out of use in the middle of the afternoon on the Cumbrian coast.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
IF one is provided. Having one at all is not required.
eMeS
Member
So, could this court case result in TOCs removing toilets in future designs?
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Quite possibly.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Cross Country really is a very poor TOC. There does seem, however, to be a continuing theme there based on ownership.
But no, there is nothing suitable about a 2-car DMU on anything other than a country branch line, and these days not even all of those.
Dstock7080
Established Member
Just being pedantic; the Pullman cars operating out of Baker Street, withdrawn in the early years of WWII, were fitted with a toilet.
Dumb question from the cheap seats...
A train has 1 accessible loo and 1 broom cupboard loo.
If during the course of the journey, something happens that means that the accessible loo has to be locked out of use (Let's say vandalism, or someone missed really badly) but the broom cupboard loo is still functional.
Do the new PRM changes mean that both need to be locked out of use for equality?
Would the service end up cancelled due to the fault?
I was coming down from Waterloo and as I was boarding, the guard apologised that there were no toilets on board due to empty water tanks and no one to fill them, but the service had been deemed fit to run. He made a later announcement along the same lines later, saying that it did make more sense to run the service than cram everyone on the next one. Ironic that a service from Waterloo had no loo water.
A train has 1 accessible loo and 1 broom cupboard loo.
If during the course of the journey, something happens that means that the accessible loo has to be locked out of use (Let's say vandalism, or someone missed really badly) but the broom cupboard loo is still functional.
Do the new PRM changes mean that both need to be locked out of use for equality?
Would the service end up cancelled due to the fault?
I was coming down from Waterloo and as I was boarding, the guard apologised that there were no toilets on board due to empty water tanks and no one to fill them, but the service had been deemed fit to run. He made a later announcement along the same lines later, saying that it did make more sense to run the service than cram everyone on the next one. Ironic that a service from Waterloo had no loo water.
WelshBluebird
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Where the hell would anyone get that insane idea from?
mallard
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How so? ATW and Chiltern have the same ownership and are far better in just about every way (ATW's "no growth" specification from the DfT notwithstanding). Seems to me that the quality of Arriva's franchises isn't at all consistent. I suspect that they're given quite a bit of autonomy and it's really just up to the specific franchise's management.
As something that's more relevant to this thread, I was actually on board the train in question (it's part of my daily commute) and was seated near Mrs Wafula-Strike as I was travelling with a bike, so I remember the journey quite clearly. I find it very surprising that this thread lambasts XC for their part in the problem, but EMT gets a pass.
The train in question has a 9-minute timetabled stopover at Leicester and was running more-or-less on time as I recall. That should be plenty of time to allow a disabled passenger to use the station toilets. Additionally, the train was a service to Cambridge, not direct to the stated final destination of Stansted (presumably Airport), a quick check confirms that changing trains at Leicester would have been no slower than changing later in the journey, meaning that even if the 9 minutes wasn't long enough, the 32 minutes between trains would certainly have been. The BBC article mentions that (and it correlates with my memory of the incident) "there was nobody to help her at that station" (and the previous article says "The next possible platform was Peterborough", leaving little doubt that it's referring to Leicester).
The fact that EMT (as managers of Leicester station) did not have staff available to assist with de-training a disabled passenger makes them just as culpable as XC in my opinion. The XC on-train staff definitely reported the problem to their control, so there's little doubt that EMT were informed (presumably the industry has mechanisms for alerting upcoming station staff to the presence of passengers needing assistance, even if the train and station are operated by different TOCs).
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
The train had a guard. What was he doing?
Or have we reached the point where guards aren't allowed to use platform ramps? In which case the railway needs its collective heads banging together (or an on board ramp on every single train).
By quickly reading posts earlier in the thread that implied an all-or-nothing approach
Because for some people, it’s apparently an exceptional effort to (a) arrange toilet stops at stations when the universal loo is broken, (b) tank the toilets adequately in the first place.
Whenever a person or organisation says this, they’re effectively saying “OK, we’ll treat everyone like we treat disabled people, and see how they like it.” The fact this is a bad thing arguably shows more about their attitude to disabled people than they intended.
I think you mean unarguably
mallard
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Whenever I've seen disabled passengers board/alight trains (including XC) at Leicester, the station's ramp has always been used, usually with both station and train staff assisting. I've seen XC train staff use the train's ramp at other stations though, so there's probably some specific regulations at Leicester for some reason.
221129
Established Member
And what has that got to do with XC? You'd be stuck with them regardless of who had the franchise...
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