Globaliser, I don't know if you saw the news this week that the over 60s now outnumber the under 16s in the UK. The relevance of this fact to the debate on this thread is that there will be an increasing number of 'less mobile passengers' in the future.

As for lifts on the Tube, I don't know if you have heard of Metcalfe's Law of networks. Broadly stated it says that the usefulness of a network is proportional to the square of the number of nodes. As as been pointed out elsewhere the current provision of lifts means that there are very few useful journeys that can be made today on the tube. But that is not a reason not to start the process of upgrading the network. BR managed it quite successfully, having started 40+ years ago.

My father has been in a wheelchair for 25 years now, and has suffered the indignities of being strapped to a back board so that he could get off a flight at Faro. He gave up on flying as it was just too much like hard work.

Coming back to your point, it is a very good question what is the best way to provide transport for wheelchair users in a busy city like London. Taxis don't work - yuo can't just assume that there will be one on the street when you need it, and have you tried pre-booking a wheelchair accessable taxi? If you can book on, it often won't turn up on time as they are so few and far between. Buses are getting there, but only if they bother to get close to the kerb. Private cars are really the only option, except some ***hole has parked in the disabled spot.

Simon.

This should surely tell yousomething

They have, at considerable expense, "got there". In London the entire fleet has been replaced in the last 10 years with wheelchair-accessible ones. This has had a number of notable effects. One is that, for a range of reasons in combination, such buses have significantly less seats than their predecessors, so many more passengers have to stand - a key way to drive people away from public transport. The second is that such buses cost twice as much as before (and , in combination with the previous point, four times as much per seat). A third is the wheelchair ramps the are all fitted with now are used so rarely that, should a wheelchair passenger actually present thmselves, the ramps are often found to be rusted/jammed in position. That's great. Private cars are one of the few means of transport nowadays which are not adapted for disabled transport, and not required to be, yet the disabled find them (of course) the best option, over all that expensively adapted public transport. What a policy !

To answer the original questions, my LCC airline has noticed very little change as our procedures were already in place to comply with the new legislation. As shown in the video, it is the airport who is responsible for providing the majority of the assistance required, the airline only being responsible for passengers on board (and disabled passengers need to be largely self-reliant or accompanied with a carer if not). If you require assistance, be sure to book it as early as possible (at LEAST 48 hours before flying) and arrive at the airport well in advance (at LEAST 2 hours) before flying to avoid problems. Sometimes we do need to board disabled passengers last if they are not at the airport in time for boarding first (or if the airport is in a remote corner of the EU and lacks the efficiency of the Belgian airport shown in the video).

To answer a question about costs, airlines themselves have very little additional costs, as it is the airport which provides the majority of the services. (The airport then charges the airlines for all the facilities and services it provides which is why the 'fee' portion of a ticket varies from airport to airport).

To contribute to the discussion on other forms of transportation, I read some research in Australia that showed it was cheaper to continue providing vouchers for taxis than converting buses to accommodate wheelchairs, and in general this was the preferred option by wheelchair uses at the time as it was a door to door solution (no cracked footpaths to negotiate and waiting for buses). However, the buses have now all been updated and the taxi vouchers no longer exist. I'm sorry though I can't find the original source as it was about 10 years ago.

On the contrary, the question of the sensible allocation of limited resources is always a question of today. It's one of the primary functions of government. This will never change. Nobody has an absolute claim to any resource.What use to anyone is a Tube line or station that doesn't get built at all, because it's too expensive to do so if it is required to be "accessible"?

If one takes the view that as a matter of principle, the line or station shouldn't be built at all if that makes it too expensive, then that is merely a position of unreasonable and unreasoning dogma.

So we've got this new law, been in force for less than a month, and you are arguing for repeal, Globaliser? Or just arguing that the law should be ignored because you don't feel it's reasonable?

One hallmark of the unreasoning dogmatist: Nothing is up for discussion. Everything is either right or wrong. Once something has been done, it must never be allowed to be undone. If you are not 100% in agreement with it, you are obviously a total opponent. You are not allowed to ask any questions at all about whether it might not have been a good idea to do it, or to do it in this way.

BTW, just by coincidence, on the way to work this morning I saw for the first time (in 23 years of living in London) someone in a wheelchair trying to get on to a bus. The bus that I was on. The ramp was jammed and she couldn't.

Unreasoning dogmatist? Give me a break :rolleyes:

I am not surprised about your bus experience - closer to home rode on a Long Stay Car park bus at Stansted the other night and overheard a radio request for a ramp-equipped bus (they ALL are) to pick up a wheelchair user. Very sensibly before the chosen bus was sent to the pick up, they thought to test the ramp round the corner out of sight - and it worked - our driver thought that was a something of a miracle :p