With its MobilPlus concept, the ZVV is pursuing a phased policy of making public transport easier to use for passengers with disabilities. The intention is for all the information systems and sales offices to have been converted to make them suitable for people with disabilities by 2014. By that same date, an attractive network of services covering all parts of the ZVV’s territory ought to be available too. This will facilitate the integration of people with disabilities and serve as the springboard for a 100% disabled-friendly network by 2024.
As far as blind and partially-sighted passengers are concerned, the plans are to have radically improved the equipment and services affecting them by 2014 to such an extent that they will be able to use public transport throughout the whole of Canton Zurich without needing assistance. To achieve that, it is going to be necessary to make adaptations to the means for finding stops, platforms, vehicles, ticket counters, vending machines, public conveniences, and so on. The necessary improvements also include the operation of automatic ticket machines and special markings at the large interchanges and bus stations. Blind and partially-sighted passengers ought also, however, to have access to all the important communication and information media. This includes, by way of example, timetable information, indications of seat reservations before and during their journey, public-address announcements of stops inside vehicles, up-to-date information at stops and inside vehicles concerning disruptions to services and connections, suitably adapted internet pages, and much more. In a general redesign of its internet pages around the end of 2004, ZVV also bore that goal in mind.
The following text describing the concept for passengers with disabilities, presents a summary of the results of the preliminary study and the decision in favour of one of the proposed variants. In it, you will not find any further details of specific measures to assist blind and partially sighted passengers. What it does contain is information about the objective, the procedure and the necessary adaptations for the various groups of people with disabilities, the funding and the planned next steps.
On 14 May 2001, the
In the spring of 2001 the ZVV, in cooperation with various organisations representing disabled people, transport companies, public authorities and individual specialists, launched the process for drawing up its concept for passengers with disabilities.
The measures are targeted on meeting the needs of people who are generally able to move around in public places unaided, but whose mobility is in some way restricted (including problems with the senses of sight, hearing and touch as well as mental, psychological and age-related limitations, and so on). A secondary target group has been defined as all other persons whose mobility is impaired by having prams, small children, heavy luggage, and so on, to take with them.
Public transport is to be improved in such a way that people with disabilities will be able to travel by public transport and move around inside vehicles autonomously and without needing assistance. Autonomous disabled use of public transport includes:
In those instances in which it is not possible to guarantee suitability for completely autonomous use by disabled passengers, the ZVV reserves the right to provide reasonable combined-mobility services, such as those offered by ProMobil, to run parallel services or to provide assistance.
The Swiss federal legislation on equality for handicapped people lays down that there is to be a coarsely meshed network of services suitable for disabled passengers throughout
The ZVV looked into different variants for those measures to be implemented by 2014. A cost/benefit analysis showed that the “basic services only” of variant 1 and the “MobilPlus” (“M+”) variant 2 would be economical. Both of these variants envisage the provision of basic services with a good frequency throughout the whole ZVV territory and thus satisfy § 18 of the cantonal law on public transport. The demand-driven variant 3 would have satisfied neither of the criteria, whereas the “maximum complete service” (“XL”) variant 4 would only have satisfied the second one.
The “MobilPlus” variant is based on the requirements of the law on equality for persons with a disability. This brings appreciably better advantages for people with mobility restrictions than would the “basics-only” variant 1 and is thus ideal for working out the shape of the service to be offered by 2014 and the further improvements to it between then and 2024. By including those public-transport stops that are of social interest (cultural institutions, schools, public offices and so on), it contributes to the general integration of people with disabilities. For that reason, the formal decision was taken in favour of the second variant called “MobilPlus” (or “M+”). This is presented below.
Making sure that public transport is suitable for passengers with disabilities calls for various adaptations to be made to the infrastructure, for the acquisition or conversion of vehicles and for numerous measures concerning the general services provided for the travelling public.
Some of the projects and acquisitions would normally have needed to be completed by 2014 anyway, quite apart from the implementation of the concept for passengers with disabilities. For this reason, the following elements were taken as being in existence already and were not included in the consideration:
For the MobilPlus variant, the railway, tram, bus and boat companies are going to have to adapt more than 400 platforms, the edges of 900 stops and 20 landing stages. In addition, around 500 stops are to be fitted out with equipment for providing up-to-date information. The S-Bahn network is going to need to acquire four new train sets and convert at least 46 others. The VBZ needs five additional low-floor trams.
As far as the general services for passengers are concerned, all the important sources of information as well as the communication and vending equipment, plus their ancillaries, are to be adapted to suit the individual categories of people with disabilities (problems of sight and/or hearing, wheelchair-bound and mental and/or psychological difficulties).
The total sum required for investments in infrastructure and vehicles amounts to approximately CHF 312 million. This is going to occasion a mean annual outlay of roughly CHF 11.6 million for the ZVV.
The likely breakdown of the costs of investing in the infrastructure is as follows: ZVV (roughly CHF 117 million), SBB (roughly CHF 93 million) and the communes (roughly CHF 23 million). The sum mentioned here to be paid by the communes only relates to the direct costs of improving public-transport stops. Defining further details, such as the general accessibility of public transport or improving public thoroughfares would go beyond the scope of this concept. The investments in vehicles are to be channelled through the annual ZVV payments to the transport companies.
To this must be added the annual costs for the services (information, sales, signage/orientation, and so on) in the range of CHF 1.35-2.35 million. The ZVV is also going to handle these through its annual payments to the transport companies.
For the ZVV, the total annual cost for infrastructure, vehicles and services amounts to CHF 13–14 million.
From the point of view of business economics, the following are the resultant benefits: additional revenues thanks to more public-transport journeys by disabled passengers, greater demand generated by improved comfort and convenience and shorter journey times for all other passengers and a reduction in the sum to be paid by the ZVV to ProMobil (the Zurich foundation for disabled transport) compared with what it used to pay. Whereas only the additional costs have been considered as regards the expenditure side, all the advantages have been taken into account for the benefits side (i.e. including the benefits of the upgrading measures and acquisitions).
The hoped-for success will, however, only be achieved on the scale assumed if the communes served by the public transport concerned also implement programmes to make their public thoroughfares easier for disabled persons to use and correspondingly improve the accessibility of stops.
Cost/benefit analyses show up big differences between the four variants. The business case is best for variant 1 (basics only) and variant 2 (MobilPlus). These have costs of CHF 9.6 million and CHF 13.5 million respectively, facing benefits of CHF 14.4 million and 16.4 million. The main reason for this is the low outlay on vehicles required by these variants, since significant parts of the fleet would need renewal anyway, quite apart from the implementation of the concept for passengers with disabilities. This element thus does not cause any costs.
The third (demand-driven) variant would require a much higher investment than the MobilPlus variant (CHF 18.2 million compared with CHF 16.4 million). The difference results from the SBB’s and VBZ’s additional outlay on vehicles.
The fourth, maximum (“XL”) variant would have fared poorest of all, with an outlay of CHF 35.2 million, since it would have required very high additional expenditure to reach its 2014 target. This is a situation that is going to have to be achieved by 2024 anyway.
Various specific measures have already been launched. Starting in 2004, the S-Bahn has gradually been bringing low-floor trains into service and, since 2005 or so, has had 35 new double-deck trains suitable for passengers with disabilities in service. By 2010, it is intended to have around a hundred trams equipped fully or partially with low floors running on the
The plan set an original target of mid-2004 for the transport companies to work out the details of their implementation concepts and to coordinate them with one another. The transport companies and the organisations representing passengers with disabilities are working closely together in establishing the details. The new timetable introduced at the end of 2006 was the first one with genuine end-to-end connecting services suitable for passengers with disabilities.
Early in 2003, the communes organised special events to provide information about the concept for passengers with disabilities. By the end of 2003, an outline concept had been drawn up for the cooperation between them and the transport companies.
The disabled-friendly improvement of the general services for passengers (information, sales and so on) is guaranteed to form a part of ongoing and planned projects. The necessary measures for individual, previously-unresolved issues were defined around the middle of 2004.
The funding required for disabled-specific investments was first included in the ZVV’s financial planning for the years 2005–2010 and has also been specifically itemised and applied for as such in its framework appropriations starting with the one for 2005/06.