[Academic] FW: Travel Impact for Disabled Students from COP26

[Kirsten Munro]

Please see statement from Disability Services below.

Kirsten

Kirsten Munro
University of Strathclyde
Physics Department
John Anderson Building
107 Rottenrow
Glasgow G4 0NG

Tel:  0141 548 3386
Email: kirsten.munro at strath.ac.uk<mailto:kirsten.munro at strath.ac.uk>

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From: Chris McKenzie <chris.g.mckenzie at strath.ac.uk>
Sent: 22 October 2021 13:59
To: chris.g.mckenzie+ddc at plists.strath.ac.uk
Cc: Disability & Wellbeing Service <disability-wellbeing at strath.ac.uk>
Subject: Travel Impact for Disabled Students from COP26

Dear DDC's,

I hope you are all well. Like many, we have been attempting to plan for the impact on students of the upcoming COP26 events, and associated travel and access issues arising.

As you will know, some of the students who use our service get support with travel to campus. Clearly road closures, a huge influx of visitors and delegates into the city and pressure on travel routes and options will potentially disproportionately impact on disabled people, and this will affect students whose travel to campus is impacted by the nature of their disability, whether that travel be by public transport, private vehicle or taxi.

I wanted to flag this to you to request a sympathetic approach to be used if students ability to attend on campus teaching is compromised, as we know students have been in touch to flag their concerns. For example, those students using taxis to get to campus have been told that there may be difficulty getting taxis on time to and from campus, even when booked in advance. We have followed this up with Glasgow Taxis, our main taxi supplier and received the following information:

Thank you for your recent inquiry.

At the moment, a broad spectrum of transport suppliers across Glasgow and the UK are seeing significant pressures as a direct result of COVID and the pressures of one company only serve to compound upon another. Demand is very high.

At GTL we will always make every effort to minimise the impact on your transport, to the best of our ability. We will always try to manage our clients' expectations, but we have to be honest, delays at the moment may be inevitable, throughout the day, and particularly at peak times when demand for all for forms of transport is higher.

COP26 begins 31 Oct until 12 Nov, but we will see the effects on transport before then. Glasgow City Council has released information on their generic website but also on their Get Ready Glasgow website and we encourage everyone to have a look.

The security around COP26 and the road closures will be significant and like nothing we have ever seen before. For every road closure, there will be a diversion, and for every diversion, there will be traffic jams. There will be issues concerning access to places, be they home addresses or businesses, also. On top of all this, there are the known unknowns of protestors and what they may bring, and where.

We can only advise everyone to consider if they need to travel, and if so, consider when they do. Peak times are normally approx. 07:30 > 09:30 and then 14:00 > 16:30. However, given the issues we will all inevitably face, these peak time blocks will increase.

For this period, Glasgow Taxis cannot meet any special requests for hiring taxis for the day, week, etc., nor special requests for hybrid or electric taxis. We also cannot make any guarantees that booking times will always be met; we will be honest and say that they probably won't be.

We are more than happy to assist with any normal bookings you wish, but with this advice, be prepared for delays in both arrival times and length of any journey, please.
We hope to minimise impacts on students who use taxis and advise them accordingly around expectations for increased travel times etc. We are aware that these same travel difficulties will likely impact public transport users too, and for many disabled students there is less flexibility available for travel time, route choice or travel requirements etc than for their non-disabled peers.

We are hoping everything goes smoothly, but are realistic enough to expect problems which are outside both our and the students control.

As usual, if you have any specific concerns about this please get in touch with me directly to discuss.

Best wishes,
Chris

Chris McKenzie

Disability & Wellbeing Manager
Disability & Wellbeing Service,
University of Strathclyde,
Rm 467, Mary Dunn Wing,
Learning & Teaching Building,
55 Richmond Street,
Glasgow,
G1 1XQ

Tel: 0141 548 3402
email: chris.g.mckenzie at strath.ac.uk<mailto:chris.g.mckenzie at strath.ac.uk>
web: www.strath.ac.uk/disabilityandwellbeing<http://www.strath.ac.uk/disabilityandwellbeing>

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If you feel that you need help now, please contact your GP or you can call NHS 24 on 111.

If it is an emergency situation, the following Emergency Services are available:

  *   Campus Security via calling 0141 548 2222.
  *   Emergency Services via calling 999.
  *   Accident & Emergency Service nearest to the University is the Glasgow Royal Infirmary in Castle Street, Glasgow G4.
  *   NHS 24 on 111 for Health Information and Self Care Advice.
If you need to talk to someone, below are a list of supports that are available:

  *   Samaritans Glasgow 116 123 or email  jo at samaritans.org<mailto:jo at samaritans.org>  anytime.
  *   Breathing Space 0800 83 85 87 (All weekend and Monday to Friday 6pm - 2am)
  *   Nightline 0141 552 2555. Talk online at scnightline.com, or text on 07982 107 920.
  *   Shout Textline: Text 85258<https://eur02.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgiveusashout.org%2F&data=04%7C01%7Ckirsten.munro%40strath.ac.uk%7C20e3d63c9dc548cc55c708d9955bd47a%7C631e0763153347eba5cd0457bee5944e%7C0%7C0%7C637705043918470212%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=muPQNdvFP%2F4COWVZnyGGENyrv0Si4C1Jca65I0FQaQ8%3D&reserved=0>

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