In NST: RapidKL Fails the disabled

Tuesday, April 24, 2007, 12.38 AM
NST Online » Local News
2007/04/23

RapidKL buses fail disabled-friendly test


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S. Jeyaraj is fit despite being wheelchair-bound. Yet he had to depend on someone to help him board a RapidKL bus.


KUALA LUMPUR: He was a heavy machinery technician who ran marathons and enjoyed golfing.



But S. Jeyaraj’s world literally came crashing down on him on Jan 3 last year.

Eight tonnes of machinery fell on the 29-year-old at his workplace, leaving him wheelchair-bound since.

Jeyaraj and others who share his plight have long been asking that RapidKL buses be disabled-friendly. Their wish was granted two weeks ago.

Yet, despite keeping himself fit, Jeyaraj could not wheel himself up the ramp of a "disabled-friendly" RapidKL bus.
A check organised by the Independent Living and Training Centre recently revealed that the vehicles still do not fully meet the needs of a wheel-chair-bound person.

"The passageway is too narrow, the ramp is too steep and the kerbs at the LRT stations are too high. Just because there is a ramp on the bus, it does not make it disabled-friendly," said Malaysian Animal-Assisted Therapy for the Disabled and Elderly Association president Anthony Tha-nasayan.

He suggested Rapid KL consult members of the disabled community before implementing such "half-hearted" efforts.

Also present at the test was Disabled and Rehabilitation Ward K9 Members Society (Perwira K9) president Ras Adiba Radzi.
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