Month: April 2021

Meet our Accessibility Panel

Throughout the creation of the Passenger Assistance app we have collaborated with disabled passengers at every stage. Our accessibility panel, which is made up of people with a diverse range of accessibility needs, have been instrumental in shaping the way the app works today. That’s why we wanted to take a few moments to introduce a few of them, so you can get to know these awesome people a little better.

Image of Sarah Rennie, a white woman with short blonde hair sitting in her powerchair smiling towards the camera

Sarah Rennie, Chair

Sarah chairs our Accessibility Panel. She is an Accessibility Specialist, with a particular focus on transport. Sarah doesn’t drive so she relies on rail to travel all over the country for work and fun! She has been passionate about supporting the development of the Passenger Assist app since she got involved in testing the product in 2018. Sarah’s focus, personally and professionally, is to support projects which enhance disabled passengers’ customer experience.

Chloe Tear

Chloe Tear is an award-winning disability blogger, freelancer and public speaker. Chloe is particularly interested in public attitudes towards disability. She also works part-time for Scope as a content designer. In this role, she writes information and advice that supports disabled people and their families to live the life they choose. Most weekends you can find Chloe on a train, travelling to see friends and family.

Jennie Berry

Jennie Berry, also known as @Wheelie_Good_life, is a 29-year-old disabled travel content creator who documents her life as a wheelchair user online to her audiences of over 100,000 followers. Jennie is an avid traveller, and uses her platform to speak about how she navigates public transport, holidays and work trips as a wheelchair user, as well as calling for better accessibility accommodations throughout. As well as this, Jennie is Head of Community at Sociability App, an app that helps disabled people find accessible places.

Image of Tanvi Vyas, a South Asian woman with long black hair smiling to the camera

Tanvi Vyas

Tanvi Vyas is a freelance Disability Equality Consultant and Trainer with a particular interest in improving access to transport, leisure and the built environment. Tanvi raises the profile of challenges faced by disabled people, sharing her lived experience. She is keen to embed accessibility, diversity and inclusion and in policy and practice and is a Trustee for Muscular Dystrophy UK.

Image of Alan Benson, a white man with grey hair and beard using a power chair

Alan Benson

Alan is a disability campaigner and activist with a particular interest in transport. He is a member of London TravelWatch, is Chair of Transport for All, a Trustee of Richmond RUILS and a Citizen Advocate supporting Disabled and Older People. He is a regular tweeter and blogs about his journeys when time allows. Before turning to campaigning Alan was an I.T. Manager at various colleges and universities across the country for over 20 years. He holds two degrees in Economics and live in West London.

Image of Dr Amy Kavanagh, a white blonde woman wearing black glasses and smiling to the camera

Dr Amy Kavanagh

Dr Amy Kavanagh is an award winning disability rights activist and campaigner. Amy advocates for a more accessible world through consultancy, writing, policy influencing, media and public speaking. She is committed to celebrating disability, mobility aids and encouraging others to learn about the social model of disability.

Image of Sarah Ward, a white woman with red hair wearing black glasses smiling to the camera

Sarah Ward

Sarah is a former occupational therapist, with a passion for innovation, and a love of travel. As a wheelchair user, she’s keen to see improved accessibility across the public transport network. In her spare time she can often be found exploring the UK by rail. She plays the piano and other instruments, enjoys photography, and describes herself as something of a bookworm.

Image of Dr Amit Patel, a South Asian man with black hair and beard wearing sunglasses and smiling widely to the camera

Dr Amit Patel

Dr Amit Patel is a best-selling author, campaigner, motivational speaker and independent DEI consultant. Qualified as a doctor, specialising in emergency medicine, Amit lost his sight in 2013 and is now registered severely sight impaired (blind). Since losing his sight, Amit is now an active campaigner for accessibility, speaking out against the issues that disabled people face daily. In his corporate life, he works with clients across the spectrum, from law firms and financial services to medicine and the arts, advising on diversity and inclusion.

Image of Eleanor Lisney, an Asian woman with black hair wearing black glasses and smiling to the camera

Eleanor Lisney

Eleanor Lisney FRSA MA MSIS is a founder member of Sisters of Frida and Culture Access. She was born and bred in Malaysia, and has lived in UK, France and the USA. She used to travel a good deal but lately travel has not been an option. Her favourite mode of travel is be train and have done that in various countries including in China, Norway, Italy. She writes on intersectional issues as a disabled woman of colour and is passionate on campaigning for social justice and inclusion.

Our Accessibility Panel supports our work to design products which make mobility easier for passengers with access needs. The Panel provide us with internal advice and practical recommendations on everything from product design to inclusive communication. They are paid for their time to attend meetings. Members are not employed by Transreport or ’sign off’ our products to ensure the group’s independence. Our Accessibility Panel has a wide variety of professional expertise and lived experience of disability.

The Passenger Assistance Story (so far)

We’re living in a world where technology has made it possible for us to get anything we want delivered straight to our doorstep and we can listen to any song that pops into our head in a matter of seconds. But, in so many ways we’ve fallen behind in creating technology for causes that create meaningful change in the world. In areas such as accessibility, diversity and inclusion there are many opportunities for technology to play a role in transforming lives, and Passenger Assistance is just one of them.

Back in 2017, our founder Jay Shen had the idea to make transport a more equal place. He wanted to democratise it and ensure transport operators were more aligned to their passenger’s needs, so he created Transreport. Fast forward to today and Jay’s vision has culminated in one of the most exciting apps on the market. This app, made by the Transreport team, is called Passenger Assistance and allows disabled people to arrange assistance in just a few clicks. It changes what is currently a long process, that has to be repeated each time, and that takes a lot of time and energy out of the busy lives of disabled passengers.

Why did we create this app?

We believe that everyone should be able to travel spontaneously and have the independence and flexibility they desire. If you wake up on a sunny day and decide to go to the beach, everyone should be able to do that easily and without a lot of hassle. However, we knew this wasn’t the case for a lot of disabled people, as travelling anywhere can take a lot of pre-planning. We wanted to take the first step into improving their experience and we started with rail travel. The technology our team has developed will allow a more stress-free and consistent booking experience, which has been a real issue within the disabled community for a number of years.

Working with disabled people

You might be sitting there thinking ‘that all sounds great, but how many disabled people have actually been a part of the making of all this?’ Well, a lot actually! At Transreport we support the mantra ‘nothing about us, without us’ and at every step of the development of the Passenger Assistance app, we have been working alongside disabled people. Initial workshops where those with a diverse range of accessibility needs provided their requirements for the app were instrumental in defining the user experience. A group were also assembled to test out the app and how it works in the real world, which then helped to get it to where it is today. We also have a dedicated accessibility panel who we regularly meet and consult with (virtually, of course!) who’ve made the launch of this app as accessible as possible.

What about the future?

We want this to just be the start! Although we’ve initially focussed on making the rail travel experience better, we want to take the same concept to every mode of transport. Soon we want to see all disabled people easily booking bus, airport, tram and taxi assistance through our one handy app. These things will take some time and a lot of brain power, but anything worth having is worth working for and we’re willing to put the work in. We hope you’ve enjoyed learning more about the Transreport story and if you have any questions about the app you can get in touch here.

Transreport founder Jay Shen at workshop standing in front of a screen
Jay Shen with five other people, they are all facing the camera and smiling.
Jay Shen presenting to the room of people sitting on chairs.

“We are an accessibility business first and foremost. Our ambition is to use innovative technology to improve social and economic outcomes and to make people’s everyday lives easier, particularly the most vulnerable groups within our communities. We’re already exploring how we can take this solution and apply it to other modes of transport such as buses and coaches, and air travel.”

Jay Shen
Transreport founder