The Siege

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I first wrote about Access-a-Bus on August 6, 2008, 3,743 days ago.  By the standard of the separate and unequal treatment of people with disabilities in Halifax Regional Municipality, the Siege of Stalingrad at 872 days was the blink of an eye.  In fact, the Siege against People with Disabilities is the third longest siege in history, tied with the Siege of Ishiyama Honganji in Japan (1570 – 1580).

The Siege of Halifax

Perfectly plausible alternatives have been proposed, the best of which - taxi vouchers - is cheaper, faster and much more flexible than Access-a-Bus.  HRM even commissioned a study in 2010 which recommended a trial run.  I believe that never happened.

Meanwhile, the number of accessible cabs has plummeted, from a high of around 60 to less than 20 today.  Hence we have letters like this:



My downstairs neighbor is currently having a similar experience.

Make no mistake, Access-a-Bus is an egregious act of discrimination, worthy of Montgomery Alabama in 1955.  Separate and unequal.  Someone ought to complain to the Human Rights Commission.  But they would need abundant patience, the average time from acceptance to closing of complaint being 230 days in 2017.

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Now the mayor is a nice person and the council is generally well-meaning, but their willful self-interest is just irresponsible.  For that's what it's about - protecting vested interests at Metro Transit.  Ineffective managers with a large fleet of the wrong vehicles see the taxi vouchers as a threat.

Indeed it is a threat, but people with disabilities have paid a heavy price, and the cab shortage is starting to squeeze others.

There's really no excuse.  All cabs in London are accessible.  Tourists expect that in a well-run city.

What does that make HRM?

Combat Experience

At last night's Town Hall Meeting on Accessibility, Metro Transit's Manager of Operations Glenn Bannon announced that his organization will soon be recruiting a Manager for Accessible Transit.

This is welcome news.  Ever since the attempt at revoking bus passes for blind riders, Metro Transit has demonstrated their consistent deafness and blindness to the concerns of riders with disabilities.

Because it was made in a room full of disabled Haligonians, the announcement carried an implied commitment to seek out candidates with actual practical experience in coping with a disability.  This is all the more remarkable coming from an organization that only recently learned to keep the key to the elevator on the same floor as people who might like to use it.  I'm assuming that the Manager for Accessible Transit would have the use of an accessible washroom and free access to other executives at Metro Transit.

In the military, combat experience seems to be a requirement for promotion - the same logic should apply here.  I look forward to learning how Metro Transit structures the search for candidates.  Certainly they wouldn't risk appearing to exclude applicants because their workplace is inaccessible.

A worthy long term goal for this new position would be for the holder to be able to carry out his or her duties entirely by relying on public transportation.

Gus Reed

Dear Mayor Savage

Intern Kelly McKenna writes a compelling letter to Halifax's Mayor:

Dear Mayor Savage,

Whether you live in a metropolis or a small town, the presence of public transportation is an integral part of many people's daily lives. No car? No problem! Call up a taxi and it'll be there in 10 minutes or less! Trying to save those hard-earned bucks? Not to worry either - there's most likely a bus coming your way soon.

But what if such common modes of transportation were unavailable to you, or needed 24 hours notice to come collect you? Cancel that date, tell your boss you can't attend that important board meeting, and start waiting. These scenarios may seem ludicrous, but for individuals with disabilities, they are everyday obstacles to full participation in the life of the city.

Over the past weeks, we have been researching the state of public transportation within Halifax, focusing on buses and taxis. What we found was that this city has a long way to go in order for things to be equitable.

We wrote Mr. Robar, director of Metro Transit and learned:

• The new bridge terminal in Dartmouth is accessible, as all new construction is required to be.
• Access-a-Bus, with improvements in scheduling lead times, is apparently here to stay.
• 68% of bus routes are accessible
• 52% of bus stops are fully accessible.
• Although we asked specifically, apparently Metro Transit did not follow the 2011 recommendation of the Access-a-Bus review to experiment with taxi vouchers

We have 3 major concerns:

1. 38% of our bus routes are inaccessible.  This is an unacceptable number.  We asked Mr. Robar to tell us the schedule for completion, but got no response.
2. Access-a-Bus, which should be in the business of going out of business, seems to be a permanent fixture.
3. Although Toronto is re-examining its taxi legislation and Ottawa has over 200 accessible cabs, Halifax doesn't seem to have any, or even a plan to get some, leaving people with disabilities limited options

Says Royson James, in the Toronto Star: 

"This is a goal worth achieving — not just to move athletes around during the 2015 Pan Am Games, but to move citizens with mobility challenges during the Games and, more importantly, afterwards. 

With only 85 of 4,849 taxis [in Toronto] currently accessible, citizens with disabilities have to plan far in advance to engage in life’s simple pleasures. 

“They have to plan two days ahead to be ‘spontaneous,’” says Councillor Adam Vaughan, adroitly summing up the conundrum. “People with disabilities fall in love, too. They want to go on a date on short notice, or take their nephew to the Blue Jays game on the spur of the moment.” 

For people like me to "engage in life's simple pleasures", Halifax needs to re-think its plans and  get serious about accessible transport.  I'm only 21, so I'm impatient with the future - can this be done soon, please?  

Yours truly, 

Kelly McKenna

Find our working paper on public transportation for people with disabilities here.