East Japan Railway Co, or JR East, Tokyo Metro Co. and other railway operators raised their regular fares for train services in Tokyo and neighboring prefectures by 10 yen on Saturday.
These companies will use increased revenues to install elevators and platform doors and make other efforts to improve barrier-free accessibility at train stations.
When preparing for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games, Japan Railways (JR), based on guidance from Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport required that when at JR stations, mobility scooters:
“move at a speed no more than 2km/h and follow the instructions and warnings of the train attendant, and do not use routes other than the ones specified.”
The new rules apply to scooters with a maximum speed of 20 kilometers per hour, and riders must comply with the same traffic rules as bicycles, including not riding on sidewalks. Scooter riders are advised to wear helmets, although it is not compulsory.
Over a period of more than three months, a male JR station attendant in Tokyo repeatedly made sexual comments such as “Are your breasts heavy?” to a visually impaired woman who asked him to guide her. JR East is considering disciplinary action against the station staff member.
When railway station staff help passengers with disabilities get on and off trains, they announce their locations. But that can aid assailants in pinpointing the locations of vulnerable people they can target.
A 52-year-old male driver of Orihime Bus, a route bus in Kiryu City, Gunma Prefecture, told a male passenger with a left leg and heart trouble to get off the bus early and said, “Your disability certificate is a fake,” according to an interview with the bus company Kiryu Asahi Jidosha and the city, which outsources its operation. According to the company, the driver had said that he had been given a disability certificate for six months.
East Japan Railway Co, or JR East, and others started Wednesday a trial at the railway operator’s Ueno Station in Tokyo of a system to convert station announcements and train sounds into words to assist deaf and hard-of-hearing people.
According to the police station, a nearby security camera had filmed the bars lowering when Takagaki had almost finished crossing the tracks. Immediately after she was about to turn back, she seemed to have been hit by the train, the footage apparently showed.
Under the revised law, a license system will be introduced for operators of transport services using unmanned vehicles with Level 4 autonomy, which requires no driver in the remotely monitored vehicle in an limited area. Such vehicles are expected to be used for residents in depopulated areas.
The plan is to tack on 10 yen (8 cents) to a ticket for JR East’s 16 major lines, including the Yamanote, Chuo and Keihin-Tohoku lines. The increase will go into effect from spring 2023.
Barrier Free Japan