Tokyo Metro announced on the 18th that it has developed a system that guides the visually impaired people safely in a station by reading a QR code on the Braille block with the camera of the smartphone and guiding the direction and distance by voice. It will be introduced at 5 stations in Tokyo from the 27th.
The National Center for University Entrance Examinations announced on the 17th and 16th that there was a mistake in the question booklet prepared for the visually impaired in the public examination of the common university entrance test. There is a special question booklet with enlarged letters, and two students nationwide used it. There were no mistakes in the questions in the regular booklet.
A survey conducted by the Japanese newspaper The Mainichi Shimbun that more than 80% of Japan’s accessible pedestrian signals, traffic lights that also produce sounds to let pedestrians with visual impairments know when it’s safe to cross the road, have their noise-making function muted for at least part of the day, the newspaper’s survey of the country’s 47 prefectural police forces has found.
On Dec. 6, six members of the National Council of Visual Disabled in Japan and two supporters visited the scene of the accident at Toyocho Station on the Tokyo Metro Co.’s Tozai Line in the capital’s Koto Ward. The deceased is Yukio Koike, 68, a massage therapist from Tokyo’s Edogawa Ward.
Construction work to install platform doors at Toyocho station, which is on the on the Tokyo Metro Tozai Line began this month, but was not yet completed. The work is scheduled to be completed by the end of next month.
Around 12:45 on the afternoon of 29th November, a man fell from his platform at Toyocho Station on the Tokyo Metro Tozai Line in Toyo 4, Koto-ku, Tokyo, and collided with a train (10-car train) from Nakano to Nishi-Funabashi. The man, believed to be visually impaired in his 60s living in Edogawa Ward, was taken to a hospital, but was soon confirmed dead. A platform door was installed at the station to prevent it from falling, but the door remained open before the start of operation.
The National Police Agency has decided to install equipment for the visually impaired on about 2,000 traffic lights in 2021 which uses smartphones to convey the color of signals by voice or vibration to support road crossing.
A survey conducted by the Japan Guide Dog Association revealed that the spread of the new coronavirus has also caused problems in the lives of visually impaired people who use guide dogs. The plight of people with disabilities who find it inconvenient to wear a mask or to keep a distance from people has become clear.
Mitsunobu Yoshimoto had a disability certificate for an eye disease, and Yoshimoto’s white cane has been found on the scene. There is no barrier on the platform at the station to prevent someone from falling, and the camera that was installed showed that Yoshimoto stepped off and fell onto the track. The Metropolitan Police Department is investigating the cause of Mr. Yoshimoto’s fall.
A man was served with a fresh arrest warrant on June 10 on suspicion of secretly filming visually impaired women in their houses in the capital, police said.
