I FEEL I must write to you to warn other disabled wheelchair users, be it manually or electric-driven wheelchairs they use, about the new bus stops and the dropped kerbs associated with them.
It is bad enough that around town the pavements are so poorly maintained that one has to be on constant guard that your wheelchair does not buck you into the road or the side of a building.
I don't know who is responsible for planning the street f
urniture and alterations around town, but one thing is sure – the nearest they have ever got to using a wheelchair is reading the latest government pamphlet on the subject.
They really should test their ill-conceived brainstorms themselves before inflicting them on the public.
The new-style bus stops are dangerous for the following reasons:
As you approach them the slope is too steep and is hard to push up. Heaven help someone who tries pushing a wheelchair user up one.
Once at the top, instead of being 3-4 inches of drop from the kerb, it's now 9-12 inches... and it slopes towards the road.
At any speed above one mile an hour the wheelchair turns sharply towards the road, aiming you at this precipice.
Travelling down the other side you then encounter a dropped kerb with tactile stabs which again slope towards the road – but this time you hit them at speed as you have just rolled down a slope.
I can understand the dropped kerbs being in place, but siting the two so close together is dangerous.
MARTIN ROBBINS
Peck Avenue, Boston
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