Transcript: EDF – AGE webinar on TSI-PRM, 18 January 2018
Afterwards we will distribute the information and you can still download it. It’s good to keep your microphones muted during the session as long as you are not talking to avoid noise interference. I see most of you have done that so that is great. For the captions, I will try to summarize very basic things what the speakers are saying and you have to enable a pop-up at the top of the screen to see the captions. Then I see most of you have discovered already the chatbox which is at the right-hand side of the screen and please if you have questions it would be even better to type them in the chatbox so I can collect them and distribute them to the speakers at the end of the session. Because we only have an hour so please only ask questions during the session if there is need for clarification or if you have problems like if you cannot hear the speakers or there are any technical things that have to be clarified quickly. Anything on content please write them down or keep them until the end, we have enough time then to ask questions. There is also a function at the bottom of the screen which is called raise hands which you can use later to ask questions then I can see that and I can let you ask the question. Yes, Pirkko, was that already a question or was that just a test. Ok I guess this was just a test. And finally if you want to join from a mobile or from a phone that is possible but as I sent you the information already the easiest thing is to do it via a computer like you are doing it right now I suppose. Finally, when you are speaking please say your name and which organisation you are from it is also nice to get to know each other a little bit. If there is a problem just e-mail me and I will also check my e-mails during the presentation. Yes, so that was just a quick introduction.
Most of you have probably heard something about the TSI but what is that actually? I know it’s not the easiest issue to get acquainted with but today we will try in an easy and lighter environment to give you and introduction and of course if there are any follow-up questions we can for example organize a second instalment of the webinar or answer your questions individually. Just to answer the question quickly, this is what it means “TSI-PRM”. It is just some EU jargon you could say and it means “Technical specifications for interoperability relating to accessibility of the Union’s rail system for persons with disabilities and persons with reduced mobility”. So that was the very short introduction and now I hand over to my colleague Lena Nielsen who is also member of the working group on the TSI and she will a short introduction about the background and also what are technical specifications and she will speak also via the platform so she is not here the eh office with us so she will tell me when to forward the slides. Thank you.
Lena: Hello everybody, can you hear me? Yes, very well, loud and clear. I’m representing the EDF expert network as Marie said appointed by the Danish umbrella DPO. And we go to the next slide. Because in December 2006 one of the most legally binding decisions was adopted by the United Nations to enhance our living conditions for persons with reduced mobility and disability, namely the UN rights convention which the EU and all her member states are obliged to implement. And article 9 of this convention it says that states parties shall take appropriate measures to ensure to persons with disabilities access on an equal basis with other to transportation both in urban and in rural areas. And of course this goes much further than the context of the TSI-PRM but it gives the general principle and intention to improve accessibility of rail travel. And related to the TSI-PRM we can state the fact that we as passengers with disabilities have exactly the same need for being able to travel by train as spontaneously and independent as everybody else. And besides article 9 UNCRPD it also states that we have a right to be independent of independent of other persons it says so in article 3, we have the right to be treated with dignity also in article 3, etc. The TSI-PRM are a practical tool to implement the UNCRPD. Next slide. And the next again. Next slide. Of course what are these TSI-PRM? It is a law of the European Union, it is a Regulation that provides technical specifications on how to make trains and stations accessible. It’s a part of the Union’s interoperability legislation for railways which is a tool of harmonized standardisation in order to support the Union’s policies of ensuring the cross-border movement of people – us – goods, services, and capital in the internal market of the Union. It’s defining the minimum technical and operational accessibility requirements for the members states to comply with. Next slide. They had to comply with this in order to include the target groups of rail passengers with reduced mobility and disabilities in this cross-border rail system in Europe. In fact this first aim should through those common specifications make it possible for me, as a wheelchair user, to travel by train from Copenhagen in Denmark to Vienna in Austria. And that sounds good. The other aim is to harmonize these rail standards for infrastructure and trains to ensure the interoperability for the trans-European rail system and that is for the EU rail market to be able to cross borders. That means the TSI-PRM are one among other TSI tools that are designed to open the rail market making it possible for rail operators in France, Germany or Sweden to take over rail markets in Belgium etc. Those TSI are drafted by the European Railway Agency and adopted as a decision by the European Commission and the Member States. And the next one. We are going to look at how those technical specifications work. Next one. These specifications are binding technical rules that reflect the EU overall accepted level of rail accessibility. They are supported by voluntary European Standards to give more details. They are drafted by a working party of the European Railway Agency with representatives from member states, the European Commission, various stakeholders like infrastructure managers, railway undertakings, train manufacturers, and passengers, including representatives of EDF and AGE. And the next. And they are of course important because of their status being a law that is directly applicable in the member states as it is a regulation. And thus the TSI are a very powerful tool on EU level to implement the UNCRPD. And the next. We have some example of what these requirements are in the TSI: obstacle free route, tactile walking surface indicators, safety information and safety instruction, level access and boarding devices, wheelchairs that are transportable by train, doors and entrances, ticketing, information desks, assistance points, priority seats and wheelchair spaces, toilets, etc. Next slide. An example of those specification is the TSI definition of “level access” here shown by a photo of a train from Switzerland with a mother and a baby pram boarding a train and a person in wheelchair boarding right after her. Level access ensures all of us to be able to travel independently without the really tiresome and barrier-creating assistance from other persons. And the other photo on this slide shows a handrail at a staircase with braille indication the number of the platform and furthermore the handrail is provided with tactile arrows for indicating the direction and wayfinding. And this photo is from Holland. And now my final slide. Unfortunately the TSI-PRM allow all kinds of boarding the trains and without any indication of first priority or best practice. It allows level access or the external “monster lifts” or the train-fixed boarding device like ramps or lifts. The photos on this slide shows this external lift extending at the platform normally and it is nicknamed the “monster lift” and it is not a dignified or independent way of access. It creates dependence on the assistance of other persons and this kind of lift is the main course of the prenotification claim of up to 48 hours before travel. The other photo shows an on-board ramp fixed to the doorway of the train in 171 trains in Austria allowing at least spontenous turn-up-and-go access as the on-board ramps or lifts are operated by the on-board personnel. Well I think this was my bit of the presentation so Peter I think I leave the word to you now.
Marie: Thank you very much Lena I think this was a very good introduction. Now it is indeed Peter’s turn and he will explain more of the history also how EDF and AGE got involved in this decision-making or law-making procedure and the reasons why the TSI were developed. Unless there are any urgent questions for clarification I suggest we continue. I’m sorry it took a while to turn on the camera so I was a bit delayed there. I’m trying my best with the captions I will now follow up and see if the captioner has joined because I don’t know the name but for now Peter will continue and I will try continue typing.
Peter: Thank you Marie, good morning everybody. My task really is to explain how it happened or what the history is. For years, many years, the railway has had technical specifications mainly on how it operated itself safely, those were the initial concerns. There should be the same thing all over Europe. It wasn’t until 2003 that they started to look at the users, us, the people who require it who are either PRM for whatever reason and so as a result of that governments recognized the value of the disabled, recognized the value of people going and we had these three new TSIs, one of which affects us which is access to people of reduced mobility. The other one was about railway tunnels and air pollution. And the EU had a draft mandate and you should understand that we should all recognize at the time when accessibility was concerned all the different member states were at different stages of development. Some recognized the problem, some didn’t recognize it at all. In some parts of the EU the platform heights were traditionally very low, in other parts they were more modern. We started off with different views towards it. The first task was what we called “harmonizing” and we went through harmonizing and I’m on the next slide Marie if you wouldn’t mind, we were harmonizing provisions. We weren’t making it a mandate. Lena was talking quite rightly that it is mandatory right now it is part of the EU legislation; when we started and I’M speaking with 50 years on the railway, it was by no means mandatory because we couldn’t do that because we had so many different practices. The great thing we have achieved the 10 years that we have been part of the working party since 2007 is that we now know what we want and the EU has put some sensible legislation behind it. But it is important from a history point of view to recognize we cannot make things change instantly overnight, wonderful it would be if we had flat access but you must remember that a train whether it is a TGV or ICE or Pendolino, all these trains, they have a 30 years life. So therefore we are where we are with many things. We have to have ways to making it possible. And when we make it new we make it compatible. We are working sensibly and AGE and EDF have been on this working party a long time and we don’t ask for the impossible but we press very hard when we think some of the member states and some of the people are not doing their best. We are re-shaping, re-modelling, improving the TSI. We are not there to re-write it and start again. We are where we are. I have finished Marie, I have nothing more to say. Now I can answer questions when you like.
Marie: Thank you very much Peter. I’m turning on the camera now. Alright, thank you very much for this introduction. I think this gives a good overview unless there are gain any question for clarification about this input I will keep your questions, I saw there are already some questions from Judith and David and I will keep them for later. I’m handing over to Frans and he is sitting next to me so I will move over a little bit. He will talk about our involvement in the process and what we are actually working on. I will scoot over and leave this to Frans.
Frans: Good morning everybody this is Frans Moltzer and I’m working as an expert for AGE after many years working for the Dutch railways. What’s the situation now? First of all we busy with the revision of the existing text. It was already quite good but after a few years some things have to be clarified and sharpened and of course but what is very important in this period from the existing TSI-PRM to the next version which we will hope will arrive in 2018 that is the Advisory Body of the European Commission and there are NIPs, national implementation plans, and there is an Inventory of Assets. This is what I will talk about. First of all what are we doing as EDF and AGE? There is a revision of the text and it is not a complete re-write and not new rules and standards but more pin-pointing and sharpening some text. In the working party, who is there? The railway undertakings, the member states, EDF is there, AGE is there, the industry is there and what we do there is discussing about the best solutions. It is not always the best solution for us – can you talk up a little bit and clser to the computer – ok – it’s now always the best but quite often it is a compromise because the railway system as Peter said is a very old system and sometimes you have technical constraints or safety constraints. But in the discussion we increase awareness to the understandingof the lawmakers the industry andthose who are working in theindustry and what we do as AGE and EDF isto keep pressure on it
and try to convince. And keep it all on the agenda. And what we also do is providegood practical examples. Becausemaybe Peter and I are - Sorry everyoneI understand that it's a bit of aproblem because I'm typing here whichalso makes another noise over Frans'voice so if it's okay with you I willnot type right now but if you can seeFrans' face and with the slidesnormally that should be all the writteninformation. I'm really really sorryabout that but maybe this is betterbecause otherwise you have moreinterference so I will just let Fransspeak and you can read the informationin the slides and clarify things if youneed to.
- Okay what we are very happy with is that Peter and I are very much
experienced in years in in in the railwayindustry and so we can also provide goodpractice examples not only in technicalway but also in the in operationalrules. Next. - This one? - Yes.So the importance of the TSI PRM is that they provide clearspecific and binding rules for railaccessibility and in that way it'squite unique that we have some rules in the in the railway industry.And what the member states have to dothey have to make a plan and fill out the long visions for accessibility they have tomake the plans for 10 yearsand have to update it every fiveyears and that's very interestingbecause that plans can bemonitored and they can show us whatprogress the member states are makingand we as EDF and AGE are involvednot only in the drafting of theof the TSI but also in follow up andmonitoring the results. Yes as I said it's ahuge step forwards but it's not amiracle it's not a miracle solution foraccessibility and we realized verymuch that we are coming from farand yeah the rail industry is a veryold industry and there are a lot oftechnical barriers,much technical barriers, and then oldbuildings etc etc. There are manytechnical rely requirements meaningboarding devices and toilets etc.but and some of those requirementsshould have gone much further but forseveral reasons of history,reasons of technical solutions, it'ssometimes not getting far enough.What a very much difficulty will stay Ithink in the future is I think is that there arein Europe in the end two differentplatform heights. We are talking about
making accessible 35,000 stations,historical some of them, all stations,
news stations, have to be built according tothe new TSI and also when yourefurbish a station you have to beupgraded to one of the chosen platformheights. What we'll see in the future isthat the platform heights will be onnational level on one height but within Europe we have still two different heights. And there will be also always be some exemptions likedouble-decker trains for technical or safety reasonsrestaurants cars that will not always be fully accessible because of the layoutof train etcetc so there's alwayssomething to wish. And in the endimplementation national level is for somemember states quick but some member states are very slowand that's because of political will and because of the