• IN an email to Visually Impaired in Camden the council has now admitted that an equalities impact assessment of the introduction of Shared Use Bus Boarders (SUBBs) confirmed the need for further assessment of such facilities.

It is not difficult to grasp that SUBBs are likely to be a recipe for conflict between cyclists and pedestrians.

But rather than abiding by the findings and reassessing the flawed and inherently dangerous design before going ahead with implementing SUBBs across the borough, Camden Council and Transport for London have decided to undertake video monitoring and analysis for each SUBB to understand how different users interact, especially when a bus pulls up to the stop.

In other words passengers, and particularly those passengers who are vulnerable, are to be guinea-pigs in research which should have been conducted before the roll-out of these schemes.

However, as VIC and other disability organisations know, if a person feels their journey cannot be undertaken safely then they won’t attempt it at all, and so the research will not be comprehensive and will result in only a limited analysis.

VIC understands and supports the motivation to encourage more people to cycle by making routes safer, but this always appears to be at the expense of barrier-free access to public transport for disabled and vulnerable passengers.

ROSEMARY NICHOLSON
Visually Impaired in Camden