TERRIFYING JUNGLE - BRUM IN A WHEELCHAIR!

15-11-2008

Brendan King, weekend editor, describes the terrors of wheeling up and down from New Street Station to the City Centre and challenges Brum Councillors / MPs in a wheelchair challenge. 3* Star Brum? Rubbish says Kingy.

Over 20 years ago, I got trapped low down at New Street Station late on a cold winters night when I was abandoned by station staff with only inaccessible goods service lifts – which had to be operated by staff – who did not come as arranged to enable this to happen – for me to get up to concourse – street level when I arrived in a goods van from Euston on the last train that evening.

I was discovered freezing on the platform by a wayward porter 2 hours later. This was in the days before mobile phones. I’ve avoided New Street Station ever since preferring Sandwell and Dudley or Wolverhampton Stations instead.

Although I had to campaign for years for a lift at the rebuilt Sandwell and Dudley Station – mounting a sit-on-the-ground personal protest at being refused permission or assistance to alight from a train from Euston – even though my car was sat on the Park and Ride car park.

This was because the Station Manager said it was against health and safety for his staff, or fellow passengers, to lift me down from the platform to concourse / street / car park level by means of steep and lengthy platform-to-ground stairs.

This was even though staff had lifted me up them earlier in the day. I ended up by getting passengers to lift me off the train – which quickly disappeared off down the line to Wolverhampton – and me ‘bumping’ myself down the stairs and a fellow passenger following behind with my empty wheelchair (I’d dropped out of it to the ground to ‘bump’ myself down the stairs).

My bum and dignity was somewhat bruised – but the Station manager’s intransigence was dented even more so. This and further years of campaigning resulted in a lift being belatedly being installed at Sandwell and Dudley (my nearest railway station).

Nowadays – 20 odd years later – access for wheelchair rail travellers is brilliant in every respect. Even the old goods lifts at New Street have been converted to public use – independently accessible to all. Lifts that are used not only by wheelchair users and pushchair parents – but by all who have heavy luggage.

All trains now have accessible carriages – even some with accessible toilets. And New Street now has dedicated staff to move wheelchair users on and off trains an up and down the lifts and the training of all staff at all stations is now superb. And staff now take pride in looking after disabled passengers as a priority.

Sad to say, the other access problem I encountered all those years ago when first coming into Brum via New Street in a wheelchair – has not diminished. This is the problem of inaccessible streets and curbs. The dangerous obstacle course for wheelchairs in making one’s way from the station up to New Street and the Victoria Square – City Centre area.

I’ve tried to do this dangerous trip twice recently – once on my own, early in the morning, some months ago to attend a special educational needs tribunal hearing, in the Tribunal Offices at Bull Street Birmingham.

The other time was last Thursday afternoon, when I was meeting a friend at New Street Station, and we intended to enjoy the delights of the Frankfurter Christmas Market and (as it was raining) a few of the Town Centre bars and eateries.

On both occasions, it was a nightmare for a self propel wheelchair user. On making ones way out of the main entrance from the station one is confronted by maize’s of little roads and streets going in several directions – all the streets lack protected crossing points – on bendy traffic lanes with buses and cars screaming around.

There are no signs outside the station giving clear directions to the main parts of the town (I could never find any at any rate) and no signs for disabled persons using wheelchairs for them to find safe crossing points and ramped areas to avoid the many stairs and steps encountered on the steep rise from the station to the main city shopping areas.

I’d encountered these problems all those years ago with old Bull Ring shopping Mall, offering no disabled access up and down to and from the station – only escalators inaccessible to all but ambulant pedestrians.

But I thought access would have improved (as the law requires) following the demolition of the old Bull Ring 70s nightmare and the rebuilding /creation of the glossy Palisades and new Selfridges / Bull Ring area.

I was to be proved wrong. On asking a security guard on my early morning foray from New Street Station to my Bull Street ‘Hearing’ venue – I was told they usually direct wheelchair users to the department store lifts – that saves the long push up the New Street pedestrian area. But I was too early as the shops were not open at 8.00 p.m. in the morning.

So I struggled ever upwards across a series of high curbed, traffic speeding streets – zigzagging here and there trying to find elusive dropped curbs – and even more elusive narrow and steep ramps to avoid the many decorative stairways that seem to be the delight of town planners and architects.

I eventually arrived at Bull Street with the help of passers-by who bumped me up and down the very high curbs that seem to be a particular feature of the new street infrastructure.

Last Thursday afternoon, I thought I’d have a better journey from New Street to the Centre, as I’d have my friend with me. But we still both found the experience dangerous and nightmarish.

This time we did find more ramps tucked away well out of sight of the architecturally designed stairways (architects hate ramps) but none of the ramps had coinciding dropped curbs for crossing the streets and then straight up the ramp. We still had to zigzag to search for dropped curbs and still found crossing the roads and streets to be a nightmare.

And there is the issue of lack of signing for pedestrians (particularly wheelchair users) to find one’s way efficiently to and from New Street Station from different parts of the main higher level shopping and leisure / entertainment areas of the City.

On saying goodbye to friends we had met in the German Market area and having had a couple of drinks – I and my friend made our way back down to the station.

We found a blue sign showing a seemingly more direct route back down to New St Station at the bottom of New Street – this led us down a steep inclined route to a back entrance to the Station but with steep steps down to the station concourse. Then we saw a sign instructing disabled passengers to go to the main entrance.

We found we had to retrace our route up to New Street – discussing why there had been no sign up there showing the disabled, wheelchair persons, route and no information that the sign for the back entrance to the station was not to be followed by wheelchair users.

As there were no dedicated signs for wheelchair users – or anyone else to the main entrance – we eventually found ourselves making the same hazardous trip via steep narrow ramps and sharp and high un-dropped curbs a we had made on our arrival. My friend was disgusted at the unwelcoming, to wheelchair users, streets of Birmingham.

Once safely in the concourse of the Station, life became easier – the attendant system clicked into place when I presented myself to customer services and said farewell to my friend who was Ipswich bound.

And I was well looked after on arrival at Sandwell Station – with no less than three staff coming to greet me off the evening train and see me to my car.

So the new look glossy Brum City Centre remains a dangerous impenetrable unsigned nightmare for wheelchair users.

Not a place to arrive in a wheelchair at New Street Station on one’s own. I would still avoid Brum at all costs unless forced to do so by dint of a business meeting or meeting a particular friend or acquaintance. Or a really special night out.

I challenge any in-power Tory or Lib-dem Councillor to meet me on a busy weekday at Birmingham New Street Station Concourse, near the main entrance, to make the journey with me (in a wheelchair) from New St Station up to New Street, Victoria Square, Town Hall and the Centenary Square area – and even (if brave enough) across to the Bull Street / Newhall St / Library / Margaret St areas – journeys I’ve had to brave in a wheelchair on several risky and frustrating occasions.

I’ll supply the wheelchairs and we’ll bring a photographer / video camera-person to film the adventure. We’ll see how much your proud view of the improvement to 3 star Birmingham rates as an accessible 2nd City – holds up after facing the perils of Brum City Centre in a wheelchair.

CONTACT THE STIRRER THOSE WHO WANT TO JOIN KINGY IN A WHEELCHAIR CHALLENGE – AND DISCUSS ON THE FORUM