1

Note: The output shown below is from the Communication Access Realtime

Translation (CART) system used in the meeting and is unedited, with two

exceptions: the spelling of “Mr. Altrom” was corrected to ”Mr. Altom”,

and “ADAG” was corrected to “ADAAG”. The CART system was used to provide

an accommodation to persons with hearing loss and persons who are deaf,

and was streamed in real-time and available to the public on the internet

during the meeting.

1

2

3

4

5 x--------------------------------------------x

6 : RAIL VEHICLES ACCESS ADVISORY COMMITTEE :

7 : MEETING #1 :

8 : WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2013 :

9 X--------------------------------------------X

10

11

12 MEETING #1

13 DAY 1

14

15

16

17

18

19 U.S. Access Board

20 1331 F Street, NW,

21 8th Floor

22 Washington, DC 20004

23

24 Reporter: Sandra Gartrell

25
2

1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S

2 (10:14 a.m.)

3 MR. BEATTY: Okay. Time for us to start.

4 Before I turn it over to the Board's

5 liaison, advisory committee Chris Hart,

6 something about the microphone. When you speak

7 you have to use the microphone. There is a

8 little button at the bottom. When you push

9 green, it is working. When it is red, it is

10 not working. So it is important you speak into

11 the microphone. So I will turn it over to

12 Chris.

13 MR. HART: Good morning, everybody. It is

14 very exciting that we are all here today. My

15 name is Chris Hart. I am a public member of

16 the Access Board and I will be serving as your

17 liaison for this committee.

18 My role as liaison, I will be providing

19 technical advice when necessary and will

20 liaison with the Access Board on our

21 discussions here.

22 As you know, the Access Board has changed

23 its guidelines over 20 years ago. And those

24 guidelines were published with a promise of

25 periodic updates on things that might need to
3

1 be altered.

2 So here we are, 24 years later, almost,

3 and we are on the update on the rail vehicles

4 guidelines.

5 So it is really exciting for the Board.

6 The Board, as you know, has worked on material

7 vehicle guidelines and those are in process and

8 we are moving on to rail.

9 So with that, I would like to introduce my

10 friend and colleague Billy Altom. Billy and I

11 are on the steering committee and work closely

12 with many of you in this room. And we are in

13 good hands with Billy and I cannot speak of his

14 football team, but I can speak to Billy as a

15 good guitar player and Chair. So welcome,

16 Billy.

17 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

18 MR. HART: And I will turn it over to you

19 and we should do introductions of everyone in

20 the room.

21 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, Chris. I

22 appreciate that, very much.

23 Looking at the agenda, we are looking at

24 welcomes this morning. Again, welcome, I

25 appreciate everyone being here. I'm thrilled
4

1 to be here, honored that I was asked to serve

2 in the role. Kind of a new role for me.

3 I have been a transportation advocate for

4 many years now as executive director for

5 Association of Programs for Rural Independent

6 Living or APRIL. Any good disability

7 organization will have an acronym and we like

8 to go by APRIL.

9 But what I want to say is, as Chris

10 mentioned, it has been a long time. So we are

11 thrilled to be here to look at some of these

12 issues that should have been rectified a long

13 time ago, but hopefully we can find some common

14 ground and we can overcome some of the barriers

15 that prevent some of my brothers and sisters

16 with the fun things that come along with rail

17 travel. I have had the experience of riding

18 the train myself. It is a great experience. I

19 highly recommend it. Some access may be a

20 hinderance, but other than that, it is a good

21 process. I look forward to thinking of how

22 things are viewed.

23 So what we will do, we will start off to

24 my left and start off with Andre and if each

25 person will take a few moments to introduce
5

1 yourself and where you are from and who you

2 represent.

3 MR. GAGNE: Yes, good morning. My name is

4 Andre Gagne. I work for Bombardier

5 Transportation, designer of rail cars. And I

6 have been working there for more than 20 years

7 now. I used to be an engineer in designing

8 interiors of rail cars, doing rail cars,

9 passenger seating and whatnot. Now what I do,

10 I'm a senior engineer and I guide young

11 engineers in doing the same. And I am very

12 proud to be part of this committee. Thank you,

13 very much.

14 MR. XUE: Good morning. I'm Jackson Xue.

15 I am a rail engineer with PB, have been with

16 them approximately seven years or so. The past

17 few years I have been focused on rail vehicles.

18 Parsons Brinckerhoff is a consultant

19 engineering firm. We provide services

20 worldwide. The division I'm part of, the

21 transit and rail divisions, we support various

22 transportation projects throughout the country

23 and throughout the world. And one of the main

24 projects we have been focused on for the past

25 several years has been the California High
6

1 Speed Rail Program. So we are very excited to

2 be part of this committee and certainly thank

3 you for having us.

4 MR. WEISMAN: Hi. My name is Jim Weisman.

5 I'm from United Spinal Association. You might

6 have known us in another iteration when our

7 name was Eastern Paralyzed Veterans Association

8 some years ago. We have been transportation

9 advocates -- I'm a lawyer. We have been

10 transportation advocates for years, disability

11 advocates. And I was involved in making New

12 York City Transit accessible and SEPTA via

13 litigation, unfortunately, and in framing ADA.

14 In fact, some of the sections we were talking

15 about today -- and I didn't understand what we

16 were talking about then and maybe you can

17 explain it to me now.

18 (Chorus of Laughter)

19 MR. WEISMAN: I look forward to working

20 with you. I worked with some of you before and

21 I look forward to this.

22 MS. LYONS: Good morning. Crystal Lyons

23 representing the Southwest Transit Association.

24 It is an association of transit agencies and

25 business members that are in the eight states
7

1 of Texas, Oklahoma, Arizona, Louisiana,

2 Arkansas, New Mexico, Colorado and Kansas.

3 There are many rail products; light rail,

4 commuter rail and street car and there is talk

5 of all three expanding in those states so it is

6 a very important area.

7 The members includes some of the

8 manufacturers of rail cars, along with the

9 transit agencies and a lot of business members,

10 consultants and some consultants, like myself,

11 that specialize in accessible transportation.

12 So that is why I'm here.

13 MS. LINTZ: Hi. I'm Janice Schacter

14 Lintz. I am a mother of a now 19-year-old

15 daughter who has a hearing loss. I got into

16 this world because of the crumbling services

17 given to people with hearing loss. I figured

18 it was easier to change the world than change

19 me.

20 The Hearing Access was the first program

21 to bring induction loops to the New York City

22 Transit and we brought it over from England.

23 We worked with the Hearing Loss Association to

24 brings induction loops to Amtrak. We pilot

25 tested on two buses in the New York City area.
8

1 We are hoping to bring this type of access to

2 the full spectrum of hearing loss to the entire

3 country and we look forward to working together

4 with you.

5 MR. CARLSON: My name is Robert Carlson.

6 I work with the Community Transportation

7 Association of America. I'm working with

8 accessible and community transportation all

9 around the country, particularly in small

10 communities and tribal areas, as well as

11 advocating and working with the more urban type

12 systems.

13 I have been a 20-year commuter on rail

14 services of one sort of another. I have seen a

15 lot of changes and a few improvements.

16 MR. SAUCIER: Well, good morning. My name

17 is Stanton Saucier. I am representing the

18 Ricon Corporation, wholly subsidiary of the

19 Wabtec Corporation. I started off in

20 engineering and am in now marketing and product

21 planning. But basically I have spent my entire

22 career designing wheelchair lifting systems for

23 a myriad of vehicles, from private use vans

24 right on up to rail systems.

25 I have worked on the Metra program and
9

1 several projects across the country and I'm

2 very proud to be part of this process and look

3 forward to working with you all. Thank you,

4 very much.

5 MR. CORAN: I'm Josh Coran. I work for

6 Talgo, Inc., which is also a wholly-owned

7 subsidiary of, in this case, a Spanish high

8 speed train manufacturer. I have been in the

9 railroad business before I got out of school.

10 I guess my first railroad paycheck was 1967 and

11 I have been working for rail builders. I was

12 involved in the first Superliner build, which

13 was prior to ADA and was the first cars built

14 with accessible accommodations. Talgo is

15 especially repeatedly the most friendly design

16 to people who are enabled by mobility aids, and

17 I look forward to working with this committee

18 to make more equipment that friendly.

19 MR. HOLBROOK: John Holbrook representing

20 Alstom Transportation out of Hornell, New York.

21 I have been with them 22 years -- 35 years in

22 the industry -- and my job there is everything

23 to do with the interior of a car. And as long

24 as I have been there, I have been responsible

25 for ADA compliance.
10

1 MS. MARTIN: I'm Linda Martin. I'm an

2 attorney at the Federal Railroad Administration

3 and I'm here as the committee's ex-officio

4 federal member.

5 MR. BRIERS: Ken Briers. I'm a member of

6 the Board of Directors of the National

7 Association of Railroad Passengers, which is a

8 citizens advocacy group for expanded passenger

9 rail. I'm retired from Parsons Transportation

10 Group, the other Parsons. And before that I

11 worked for Amtrak and its predecessor as a

12 locomotive engineer and a conductor.

13 MR. PHILLIPS: Hello. My name is Andrew

14 Philips. I'm with the National Association of

15 the Deaf. We are involved with wheelchairs

16 from time to time and I'm excited to be working

17 with all of you.

18 MR. SLAUGHTER: I'm Blair Slaughter.

19 Don't believe the card. Officially I'm Joseph

20 and know one knows who that is except the IRS

21 and Amtrak and my teachers from grade school.

22 As I said, I'm from Amtrak. My background

23 is in industrial design. I started with Amtrak

24 in 1989, ahead of the ADA being finished up,

25 and I have been involved with accessibility
11

1 issues with Amtrak ever since. I am glad to

2 see everyone here today. I think everyone has

3 a lot of things that they are very passionate

4 about, Amtrak included, and it is key that we

5 understand that accessibility is a very fluid

6 thing. It is not a point in time. It is not,

7 you know, ink on paper. So I look forward to

8 working with everyone and moving us forward.

9 MR. MICHEL: I'm Jonathan Michael and I

10 represent RailPlan International. I have been

11 involved with the rail industry for two and a

12 half years working with Blair Slaughter on the

13 new fuel liner LDSL program and the ADA realm

14 and looking forward to working with all of you.

15 MS. GOLDEN: I'm Marilyn Golden with the

16 Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund or

17 DREDF. We are a national law and policy center

18 for disability and civil rights. I had the

19 pleasure of serving on the Access Board for

20 several terms with Jim and have worked with

21 many of you. I'm very pleased to be involved

22 with this effort and working with everyone.

23 Hoping we can come to lots of consensus.

24 MR. VONASHEK: Good morning. Justin

25 Vonashek, director of Metra NE Regional
12

1 Commuter Railroad in Chicago. We provide about

2 82 million trips per year and we appreciate

3 this opportunity and we are glad to be here.

4 Thank you.

5 MR. PEREZ: My name is Clifton Perez. I'm

6 representing the National Council on

7 Independent Living. I have been working on

8 transportation issues for many years and

9 looking forward to learn more. Very excited to

10 be in this group. Thank you, very much.

11 MS. PACHECO: I'm the not too technical

12 savvy person, I guess, at the table. My name

13 is Terry Pacheco and I am representing the

14 American Council of the Blind. I'm from the

15 greater D.C. area. I live in Maryland but I'm

16 originally from Boston.

17 I spent my life riding on rail. Right now

18 I average, between my husband, who is totally

19 blind, my son, who has got a cognitive

20 disability, and myself use Amtrak, for

21 instance, at least 75 times a year.

22 MR. CAPOZZI: It will come back. Keep

23 talking.

24 MS. PACHECO: And --

25 <<<: Maybe you can swap it out.
13

1 MS. PACHECO: Maybe it is my voice.

2 And I am pleased to be representing all of

3 the blind and low vision population in the

4 country.

5 MR. HUNTER: My name is Stanton Hunter.

6 I'm the chief of the office of rail equipment

7 for the California Department of

8 Transportation, division of rail, in

9 Sacramento. We own 102 passenger cars and 17

10 locomotives we use on Amtrak trains throughout

11 the State of California in northern and

12 Southern California. And I have been part of

13 the division of rail equipment program for 23

14 years. I now oversee all the related respected

15 functions, including computer modification,

16 accessibility, retrofits and acquisition of new

17 equipment. I'm also a part of the next

18 generation equipment committee where we are

19 currently procuring a third generation of

20 bilevel rail equipment. And I'm very pleased

21 to be here to represent the State of

22 California.

23 MR. CANNON: Hi. My name is Dennis

24 Cannon. I'm representing the National

25 Disability Rights Network, which is the
14

1 national voice for protection and advocacy and

2 client assistance program, which are mandated

3 by federal law in all the states.

4 Originally started out to protect people

5 in institutions. It has now been expanded to

6 cover a lot of things, including trying to help

7 people get -- secure their rights and

8 responsibilities throughout the United States.

9 In a previous life I used to be a member

10 of the staff of the Access Board and at that

11 point I wrote the guidelines that are

12 presently -- they are not just rail vehicles,

13 by the way, they are fixed guideways. We also

14 talk about people movers, some of which have

15 rubber tires.

16 In addition to writing the guidelines

17 themselves, I wrote or edited nine technical

18 assistance manuals covering the various modes

19 of transportation and provided a lot of

20 technical assistance on telephone and on

21 conferences and so forth on how to understand

22 the guidelines. So I'm quite familiar with the

23 kinds of things that have caused concern and

24 confusion from the industry.

25 They were written originally following the
15

1 kind of a format that was part of ADAAG, which

2 is a design to be a building code. So some of

3 the ways in which are not very convenient for

4 the engineering folks who don't follow building

5 code guidelines and formats.

6 So we have rewritten it in doing the bus

7 and van sections, which I hope everybody is

8 familiar with, because there is a chapter left

9 in that set of regulations specifically to

10 cover the kinds of things that we are going to

11 discuss here.

12 MS. BUNALES: Mr. Chairman, if I may, this

13 is Rosemary, U.S. Access Board, and I'm stage

14 left for anyone who cannot see. I do have Uwe

15 Rutenberg and Jordana Maisel on the phone and

16 your lines are open. And I also have listening

17 David Knight from DOJ and Glenn Millis from

18 Washington Metro and that is all I see. But

19 their lines are open. So if you wanted them to

20 say a few words.

21 CHAIR ALTOM: That would be great. If you

22 would like to introduce yourselves.

23 MR. RUTENBERG: Good morning. My name is

24 Uwe Rutenberg. I'm in Montreal, Canada. I've

25 been a private consultant. I work for 20 years
16

1 to make all modes of transportation accessible

2 for elderly people and those with disabilities.

3 I recently designed the intercity trains in

4 Carda (ph) to make them accessible for coaches

5 and sleepers and we have done a project for the

6 FRA recently to draft the functional

7 requirements for accessible high speed and

8 intercity passenger rail single little cars

9 with the PRIIA.

10 And I'm looking forward to continue to

11 updating the ADA regulations with all of you.

12 Looking forward to working with you.

13 CHAIR ALTOM: Welcome. Thank you.

14 Next.

15 MS. MAISEL: Hi. My name is Jordana

16 Maisel. I'm also representing Ed Steinfeld,

17 who will be on the call later this afternoon

18 and tomorrow. So we are here from the IDeA

19 Center at the University of Buffalo. Ed is an

20 architect and gerontologist and director of the

21 center and I'm an urban planner and industrial

22 engineer and we are home to the Rehabilitation

23 Engineering Research Center on Accessible

24 Public Transportation.

25 We have done many human factors studies
17

1 related to public buses for the past five years

2 and we were just extended for another five

3 years where we will continue to focus on

4 boarding and disembarking and design of buses.

5 MS. BUNALES: Mr. Chairman, back to you.

6 CHAIR ALTOM: We did have one gentlemen

7 just join us. Would you like to introduce

8 yourself, please.

9 MR. KOLIG: Good morning. My name is Eric

10 Kolig, with MARC train surface, the chief

11 officer and Maryland transit representative

12 today. Very happy to be here.

13 We are procuring 55 bilevel cars from

14 Bombardier and there are a number of overhauls

15 and new car procurement on the ARV and Metro

16 subway lines so very happy to be here and

17 participate.

18 CHAIR ALTOM: Staff volunteer for the

19 audience?

20 MS. BRUNSON: Good morning. I'm Melanie

21 Brunson and I am from Northern Virginia. I am

22 the executive director of the American Council

23 for the Blind and I'm the alternate

24 representative of that organization. Terry

25 Pacheco, who introduced herself earlier, is our
18

1 representative. Thank you.

2 MR. SHIOTANI: Ken Shiotani from the

3 National Disability Rights Network. I'm the

4 alternate and we did a report on Amtrak

5 Stations, which, I think, people may have seen.

6 I can send electronic copies. I don't have any

7 hard copies with me, if folks are interested.

8 National Disability Rights Network is the

9 protection and advocacy -- member organization

10 of the protection and advocacy programs. We

11 have protection and advocacy entities in every

12 state and every territory and we work on behalf

13 of people with disabilities in all realms from

14 deinstitutionalization to community

15 integration.

16 MR. TALBOT: Gary Talbot. I was a past

17 Board member for a couple of terms and

18 currently at Amtrak and an alternate to Amtrak.

19 MR. WETHERELL: Yes, good morning. Mike

20 Wetherell and I'm the vice president and chief

21 mechanical officer for New York City Transit.

22 I'm also representing the MTA.

23 We are petitioning for membership of this

24 group. My group is responsible for specifying,

25 maintaining, procuring over 6,000 rail cars.
19

1 We would like to join the group to help give a

2 little insight to the group for some of the

3 changes we want to make for improvements and

4 also to gain insight for our future

5 procurements. I will be giving a presentation

6 later on.

7 MR. HOFF: Good morning. My name is Ed

8 Hoff, director of ADA compliance at New Jersey

9 Transit. I will also present later on for your

10 consideration on this committee. I'm very

11 excited about this opportunity and I will talk

12 to you in a minute. Thank you.

13 MR. JOSEPH: Charles Joseph, representing

14 the American Public Transportation Association.

15 I too will be speaking later on in support of

16 an application to be on the committee.

17 MR. GRETHER: My name is Paul Grether,

18 Southwest Authority Regional Transit Authority,

19 Cincinnati Metro, Street Car Subcommittee.

20 I'm here today -- a lot of our member

21 projects with modern street car projects in

22 particular have run into a lot of issues

23 creating regulatory barriers with accessibility

24 with new modern 100 percent or partially low

25 floor vehicles. So we are here to hopefully
20

1 advocate for some updates to the subpart D, the

2 light rail portion of the rail vehicle

3 accessibility standards.

4 MR. GIBSON: Good morning. My name is

5 Calvin Gibson. I'm the civil rights director

6 of the Federal Railroad Administration, and I'm

7 Linda's alternate.

8 MS. SHURLAND: Good morning. My name is

9 Melissa Shurland. I'm with the Federal

10 Railroad Administration, Office of R&D. And I

11 work with the PRIIA group in getting enhanced

12 accessibility from the next generation of

13 passenger rail cars.

14 MS. MILTON: Hi. I'm Naomi Milton with

15 the U.S. Department of Justice. I'm an

16 attorney there. There are also a few people

17 from my office who are listening in on the

18 phone.

19 MR. FODOR: Good morning. I'm Thomas

20 Fodor with the U.S. Department of Justice,

21 Disability Rights Section.

22 MR. GOLDSTEIN: Good morning. Sid

23 Goldstein, editor of Transit Access Report.

24 MS. HAMLIN: Hello, I'm Lise Hamlin. I'm

25 director of public policy at Hearing Loss
21

1 Association of America and I will be also among

2 the people petitioning this group to join you.

3 MR. HOLMAN: Good morning. My name is

4 Pierre Holman, a principle planner with the

5 City of Alexandria and also staff liaison at

6 WMATA and I'm part of the early career program

7 within the City of Alexandria. We are

8 exploring street cars so I am kind of here to

9 learn.

10 MS. MARINA: Good morning. My name is

11 Frances MARINA representing Chicago.

12 MR. SINGH: My name is Gurmil Singh and I

13 am with Siemens Transportation Systems,

14 Sacramento. And have been with them since 1999

15 and am here to also apply with the application

16 for the committee.

17 MS. FAIRHALL: Good morning. I'm Lisa

18 Fairhall, the deputy general counsel, and I

19 will be your FACA attorney for supporting you

20 during this Federal Advisory Committee Act.

21 Thanks.

22 MS. NOE: I'm Aromke Noe. And I'm a staff

23 person at the Access Board and I will explain

24 to you about the regulatory impact analysis.

25 MS. ANDERSON: Good morning. I'm Lisa
22

1 Anderson, transportation engineer with the

2 Access Board, and eventually I will be the lead

3 staff for this rule as we move forward. I'm

4 happy to see everybody here and I'm sure we can

5 work together and get a good rule going.

6 MR. WINDLEY: Scott Windley, staff member

7 with the Board. And I will be assisting

8 Melissa with the efforts and with Paul on this

9 rulemaking.

10 MS. MAZZ: Marsha Mazz in the Office of

11 Technical and Information Services and Paul and

12 Scott and Melissa are on my staff. And our

13 office develops rulemakings and provides

14 technical assistance and training on our

15 various guidelines and standards and I will be

16 talking with you later.

17 MS. BUNALES: Good morning. Rose Marie

18 Bunales, U.S. Access Board. I'm the executive

19 secretary. I serve the director, Office of the

20 General Counsel but for this committee I am the

21 clerk managing most of the staff in the room.

22 If you need anything, just let me know.

23 MR. BEATTY: I'm Paul Beatty. I'm the

24 designated federal officer.

25 MR. CAPOZZI: Okay. Good morning. My
23

1 name is David Capozzi. I'm the executive

2 director of the U.S. Access Board. Thank you

3 all for volunteering to participate. You don't

4 know what you are getting into, but we

5 appreciate your efforts so far and what is to

6 come. Some of you know what is to come, some

7 of you have participated before and some have

8 worked in different capacities. Some of you

9 know a little bit about the Access Board and

10 some of you probably don't.

11 Let me give you a quick thumbnail sketch

12 of who the Board is, what we do and a little

13 bit about our programs and activities.

14 I have been with the Board for a little

15 over 20 years. Before that I was with the

16 Paralyzed Veterans of America. I was the

17 national advocacy director, worked a lot with

18 Jim Weisman in one of our chapters at the time.

19 And then I was with the National Easter Seals

20 Society and was one of the early directors of

21 Project Action.

22 So the Access Board is a small independent

23 federal agency. By that I mean we are not part

24 of a larger federal agency. We get our

25 appropriations from Congress, like the larger
24

1 agencies. It is just that ours is very small.

2 Our budget last year was 7 million-dollars and

3 shrinking due to sequestration. That is why

4 you don't have coffee.

5 We have a small staff also. We have staff

6 of 29. We are a fairly flat organization. We

7 are run by a Board of Directors, if you will.

8 So we have a staff of 29 and a board of 25.

9 Thirteen of the 25 are public members who are

10 appointed by the President for a term of years,

11 four years and then they can be reappointed for

12 another four years. So Chris is a public

13 member, Jim Weisman used to be a public member,

14 Marilyn Golden used to be public member, Gary

15 Talbot used to be a public member of the Board.

16 So it is good to see some familiar faces and

17 some history reflected on this committee as

18 well.

19 The other 12 members of the Board are

20 federal agency representatives. So the

21 Department of Transportation is a Board member,

22 Department of Justice is a Board member. Other

23 agencies like that.

24 We meet every other month in this room and

25 then once a year we meet out of town. This
25

1 year we will be meeting in New York City in

2 May.

3 We have four principle program areas. The

4 one that consumes most of our time and the one

5 that is going to consume your time is

6 guidelines and standards development. And we

7 develop guidelines and standards under virtuous

8 laws, like Post Offices or federal transit

9 facilities as well that receive federal funds.

10 We write accessibility guidelines under

11 the Americans with Disabilities Act for

12 buildings and facilities. So for transit

13 stations, buildings, restaurants, theaters,

14 every type of facility you can think of, except

15 for private homes and churches, and all types

16 of vehicles.

17 We don't write requirements for airlines

18 because they are covered under another act and

19 not vehicles.

20 And then we write accessibility

21 requirements for some other laws for technology

22 under the Telecommunications Act. We write the

23 Section 508 standards for electronic and

24 information technology that the government buys

25 under the Rehab Act. And then we write
26

1 standards for medical diagnostic equipment

2 under the Patient Protection and Affordable

3 Care Act.

4 We provide free training and technical

5 assistance. We have a small and shrinking

6 research program and we enforce the

7 Architectural Barriers Act. So if someone has

8 a complaint about a federal facility, they can

9 file a complaint with us. We would investigate

10 and if we have jurisdiction, fix the problem

11 with the federal agency.

12 So over the years since the ADA was

13 enacted, we have done a tremendous amount of

14 rulemaking. We wrote the original

15 Accessibility Guidelines in 1991. We

16 supplemented those immediately thereafter with

17 requirements for transportation vehicles and

18 transportation facilities, and then added

19 supplements for state and local government

20 facilities like courthouses and judicial

21 facilities. And then we added provisions for

22 children environments, play areas, recreation

23 facilities. So you can see we regulate a lot

24 of things.

25 And we just recently issued final
27

1 requirements for the great outdoors,

2 campgrounds, picnic areas, beach access routes

3 for federal facilities, trails and the National

4 Park Service and Forest Service properties.

5 We also have a lot of rulemaking currently

6 underway. We have eight different rules that

7 are in various stages or planned to be stages

8 of rulemaking.

9 One is on passenger vessels. We are in

10 the process of working on a final rule. The

11 comment period for our proposed rule is still

12 open. Another is public rights-of-way and

13 shared use paths, streets and sidewalks,

14 detectable warnings, hiker and biker trails,

15 that was a proposed rule. We are working on a

16 final rule for that.

17 Transportation, we bifurcated that. That

18 is about to be a final rule and the second part

19 is the part you are working on the rail

20 vehicles.

21 We were revisiting and updating and

22 revising our requirements for electronic and

23 information technology. We are beginning the

24 process of developing requirements for

25 self-service transaction machines, like those
28

1 that you would see at a hotel when you check in

2 or at a grocery store when you check out, to

3 make those accessible to people with vision

4 impairments or people with physical

5 disabilities in terms of reach range.

6 We are about to issue final rules for

7 emergency transportable housing like those used

8 after Hurricane Katrina, and final rules for

9 medical diagnostic and working on classroom

10 acoustics.

11 Those are the rules we are currently

12 working on with the staff of 29 that we have.

13 I want to give you a little overview about

14 rulemaking because it is an area that you need

15 to be familiar with and it is an area that some

16 people are not so familiar with.

17 The process is relatively simple, but I

18 also want to talk about our authority.

19 So under the ADA -- and that is really all

20 I will talk about. Our authority deals with

21 new construction and alterations. So existing

22 facilities are covered by other agencies, not

23 by us.

24 Under the ADA and under the Architectural

25 Barriers Act, our rulemaking goes through a
29

1 two-step process. We write guidelines. They

2 are not enforceable until they are adopted by

3 an enforcing agency. In this case under the

4 ADA, it is the Department of Justice and the

5 Department of Transportation. So we write

6 guidelines and they are not enforceable until

7 they are adopted by a standard setting agency.

8 Our authority also extends only to the

9 fixed items in a building or in a vehicle. So

10 chattel, tables that are not fixed, chairs that

11 are not fixed, the window shades in the room,

12 you know, things like that, interpreters,

13 service animals, those things that would fall

14 out of a building, if I you were able to turn

15 it upside down and shake it, we don't cover

16 those. That is not within our authority.

17 Other agencies have authority over

18 non-fixed and freestanding equipment. In fact,

19 the Department of Justice back in 2010 issued

20 an advance notice of proposed rulemaking on

21 equipment. So they have kind of staked that

22 out.

23 So the process of doing rulemaking

24 involves two steps; a proposed rule and then a

25 final rule.
30

1 So you publish a proposed rule on the

2 Federal Register, which is like the nation's

3 digest of federal regulations, it is online,

4 and then provide the public with a comment

5 period. Sixty days is the minimum. And you

6 analyze the comments and publish it in the

7 Federal Register as a final rule.

8 Part of the process also that Aromke will

9 talk about is the development of regulatory

10 assessments or cost benefit analysis. That is

11 required at both stages, the proposed rule

12 stage and final rule stage.

13 And at both stages, the proposed rule

14 stage and the final rule stage, we submit our

15 rulemaking to an agency called the Office of

16 Management and Budget. It is an arm of the

17 White House. And they review all federal

18 regulations for consistency with administration

19 policy. So it is not just us that has to go

20 through the process.

21 And then they get up to 90 days to review

22 the proposed rule and review the final rule and

23 then eventually the rule gets published. That

24 is the minimum that agencies are required to go

25 through.
31

1 We often enhance the rulemaking process

2 for a couple of reasons; one, to collect

3 information.

4 If we don't have enough information to

5 proceed with a proposed rule, we want to

6 collect that information and we can do that

7 through a variety of ways. And also to build

8 support. So some of our enhancements are to

9 build support for the rulemaking so that it

10 sees greater compliance, greater voluntary

11 compliance.

12 One of the ways that we add to the

13 rulemaking process is sometimes we will do

14 information meetings. So not a public hearing,

15 but a more informal discussion about a specific

16 topic. We will have lengthy comment periods.

17 The mandated minimum is 60 days. We will often

18 exceed that. In fact, our passenger vessel

19 rulemaking is out for about a seven-month

20 comment period. So we have lengthy comment

21 periods.

22 We will also do public hearings. We

23 typically do at least one in Washington during

24 a Board meeting and then, budget permitted, at

25 least another one outside of Washington,
32

1 sometimes in conjunction with a large trade

2 association event so that we can get a good

3 group of people with knowledge about a topic.

4 And so we will do public hearings during the

5 comment period as well so that we can hear

6 directly from people instead of just through

7 writing.

8 And then one of the other enhancements is

9 advisory committees, like this one. So we

10 often form advisory committees to give the

11 Board advice on what the proposed rule should

12 contain.

13 In one case we have actually done an

14 advisory committee to give us advice on a final

15 rule. But typically advisory committees are

16 used by federal agencies to develop

17 recommendations, to help the agency prepare for

18 a proposed rule. And that is what this

19 advisory committee will do.

20 We have used advisory committees

21 extensively since I have been here beginning in

22 1992. Since then this will be our 14th

23 advisory committee and we have involved almost

24 350 committees in those advisory committees.

25 And they run the gamut.
33

1 This was a picture of our largest advisory

2 committee that gave us advice on updating our

3 electronic and information technology

4 requirements. It was a 41-member organization

5 with representation from other countries as

6 well. Canada, Japan, Australia and the

7 European Commission were also on that

8 committee.

9 So we make good use of advisory committees

10 and we really try to listen to your

11 recommendations. To the extent that they are

12 consensus recommendation, it is very hard for

13 the Board to ignore your recommendations. So

14 strive for consensus is one of the messages I

15 can give you.

16 Just a little bit about the roles. Chris

17 Hart is a public Board member, as I said

18 before. His role is really as a liaison, to

19 listen and take information back to the Board

20 and report to them on the progress that you're

21 making and also to share any concerns that the

22 Board may have with you so you don't go too far

23 afield in an area or you don't miss an area as

24 well.

25 And then Paul's duties are more than just
34

1 paper pushing. His duties are to really

2 develop the agenda in conjunction with Billy,

3 to make sure he attends all the meetings and

4 subcommittee meetings, if you form

5 subcommittees. He keeps records. We are using

6 the CART system to both provide accommodation

7 to people in the room but it also helps us with

8 our recordkeeping as well.

9 He takes care of making logistical

10 arrangements and there are many. And so those

11 details get taken care of by Paul and Rose. He

12 develops Federal Register Notices for meeting

13 announcements and then he supports the Chair

14 during the meeting. So you will see him

15 whispering in Billy's ear. It is not really to

16 direct but make sure we keep Billy out of

17 trouble and adhere to the federal

18 acquisition -- or the Federal Advisory

19 Committee Act requirements.

20 So, again, thank you in advance for the

21 work you are about to embark on. It is a great

22 process. As I said, this is our 14th advisory

23 committee. I was involved with three others

24 before this and had the pleasure of chairing

25 one for the Department of Transportation that
35

1 wrote the original ADA regulations for DOT. So

2 I can commensurate with you but I think you

3 will find it a valuable process and we look

4 forward to your work. So thank you.

5 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, very much. Did I

6 miss anyone in the room who didn't get an

7 opportunity to introduce themselves? I don't

8 see anybody behind the pole. Okay.

9 MS. BUNALES: That is a negative and I

10 don't see anyone new on the lines either,

11 Mr. Chairman.

12 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

13 Tell you where we are quickly on our

14 agenda. What we wanted to do this morning is

15 first off get to know who is in the room.

16 Because I think it is important that we

17 establish a relationship with each other and

18 kind of become friends and see if we can find

19 common purpose here.

20 We have gone around and introduced each

21 other and listened a little bit about our

22 purpose. What I would like to do next is allow

23 Rose to talk about something near and dear,

24 where is the restrooms and lunches and those

25 issues and other administrative matters.
36

1 MS. BUNALES: I am here. I'm the one with

2 the referee shirt on today. Don't ask me why I

3 wore this today.

4 For people that are blind and visually

5 impaired, this is stage left on the side of the

6 room. Can you hear me? And I will be seated

7 behind Paul Beatty and Billy, the chairman.

8 First before I get into what I'm supposed

9 to talk about, Matthew French is assigned to IT

10 in the room. He is not here. We have WiFi and

11 the codes are placed in various places on

12 placards. If you need to get on WiFi, let Matt

13 know. And we have assistive listening. And if

14 you need a receiver, let us know and if it does

15 not work, tell us sooner.

16 We do have teleconferencing right now.

17 Again, I have the web component up on my

18 screen. I do see who is on the phone. So the

19 members you must have -- that are

20 participating, if we skip over something and

21 you need to say something, just jump in, state

22 your name and, you know, respond to questions

23 or give comments and that sort of thing.

24 Everybody else will be muted full time

25 until public comment period. So that is the
37

1 teleconferences.

2 And then evacuation, lunchroom, lunch,

3 coffee.

4 How to evacuate the room and the building.

5 First things first. We have two exits from the

6 room. The first one will actually take you out

7 to the elevator lobby and out to the

8 stairwells. The second one is directly behind

9 me and it actually goes out to the men's room

10 corridor. So what you want to do is take --

11 those who can take the stairs will take one of

12 two stairwells. The ladies room will take you

13 out to the rear of the building, to the G

14 Street alley.

15 When you exit the alley you turn left and

16 you head over to the TD Bank. When you exit

17 the men's room side of the stairwells, the

18 stairwells take you out to the building lobby.

19 You will exit the building and turn right and,

20 again, head toward the corner where the TD Bank

21 is located.

22 Actually the window side of the building

23 now is when you walk outside. That is F

24 Street. And if there was nothing in front of

25 you, you would be staring at the Smithsonian
38

1 Castle and the Washington Monument. To the

2 right is the White House and the Treasury

3 Building and to the left is the Verizon Center

4 and Capitol Building.

5 So what you want to do is to find the TD

6 Bank. Our rally point, if we have to evacuate,

7 is to go to the White House to the end of the

8 corner and wait for further instructions at the

9 TD Bank.

10 Men's room are pass the elevators and

11 hairpin right. And ladies' room is pass the

12 elevators and hairpin right. The exit

13 stairways are right angle left and right angle

14 right, just pass the elevators. If I'm going

15 too fast let me know.

16 There are plenty of places to get food,

17 plenty of places to get coffee.

18 Same thing with Metro and parking. Metro

19 is to the left and plenty of parking anywhere

20 you need to go. Sorry I said it wrong. But

21 there is also plenty of parking also.

22 Administrative stuff. I do keep

23 everybody's email and your addresses and

24 everything like that current. If anything

25 changes, you need to let me know. If you
39

1 change a member or alternate, you need to let

2 me know.

3 Also when you come in every day you need

4 to sign the visitor log. That is for

5 everybody.

6 Outside of that, is there anything that

7 people need me to explain again, or if you have

8 any other burning questions?

9 As far as the teleconferencing goes, yes,

10 we have people on the teleconference so in

11 order for them to hear you, you need to use the

12 microphones.

13 And everybody when you take the mic, state

14 your name before you go into your questions or

15 your comments.

16 Mr. Chairman.

17 CHAIR ALTOM: Perfect, thank you, very

18 much. One of the things too we were emailed

19 before we all got here kind of a bullet pointed

20 agenda that we looked at during our welcome.

21 There were eight points on that particular for

22 today. We look at overview of the committee

23 charter, we look at our Federal Advisory

24 Committee Act overview, a review and approval

25 of protocols, potential new membership. You
40

1 have heard many of them talk in the audience of

2 prepared remarks. We also establish our future

3 meeting dates and starting to review the

4 current rail guidelines and establish our

5 committee priorities. And then at the end we

6 will have an opportunity again for public

7 input. Excuse me if I'm a little hoarse today.

8 I am still battling a cold I have not been able

9 to shake yet. Bear with me.

10 We would like to go over the overview of

11 the committee charter and purpose and

12 rulemaking process and I'm thrilled to have

13 Marsha and Aromke help me with this.

14 MS. MAZZ: Bear with me. I am going to

15 ask Rose to advance the slides because I use

16 screen magnification and if I zoom up you will

17 get sick. The first slide it says "Committee

18 Purpose." I am really not going to go into

19 great detail on the charter. You all have a

20 copy of it, I presume, and you can refer to it

21 later.

22 The main purpose of the committee is to

23 advise the Access Board on updates and

24 guidelines. And this is truly an advising

25 role, although, as David said, because you are
41

1 a consensus body and to the extent you reach

2 consensus, the Access Board finds it very

3 difficult to overlook that advice.

4 Although you are not writing the

5 regulation, certainly you are in the role of

6 contributing to it in an incredibly meaningful

7 way.

8 Next slide.

9 David has already talked a little bit

10 about why we use advisory committees. And I

11 think we are one of the few federal agencies

12 that uses advisory committees pretty much as a

13 routine matter. We find it combines the best

14 elements of consensus development, consensus

15 standard development and rulemaking and the

16 federal practice in that consensus bodies

17 typically works on procedures where everybody

18 can play, everybody can contribute. It is very

19 open, as is this process here. It is open, it

20 is open to the public. Anybody can listen in

21 and anybody can review your records.

22 And during public comment, anybody who is

23 a member of the public can contribute their

24 thoughts to the directions you are going in.

25 And it also has the advantage of the
42

1 federal process where we publish a Notice of

2 Proposed Rulemaking and then once again,

3 anybody can comment on that proposed rule and

4 we are bound to take their comments seriously.

5 So that combination, I think, really

6 strengthens our process.

7 In all honesty it allows the Board to

8 access expertise that is not readily available

9 to us. As David said, we have 29 staff members

10 and we don't have every possible expertise on

11 staff and never could with that size of an

12 agency.

13 So we are tapping in here to a lot of

14 expertise about the needs of people with

15 disabilities and engineering factors and

16 industrial design factors and other factors

17 that will contribute to good decisions about

18 the rule.

19 And David also mentioned that this process

20 develops support for the rule and we really

21 hope that each of you will be a proponent for

22 this rulemaking as we go through from your

23 committee report to our proposed rule and to

24 our final rule. Although we know that not

25 everybody will agree with every jot and tittle
43

1 in it. By and large we hope that you will

2 advocate for this rule to go forward.

3 One of the things I want to address that

4 is under our jurisdiction -- next slide. And

5 by the way, there are no pictures on my slides.

6 So I'm not describing any.

7 One of the things that I want to address

8 is sort of what we can address. And David

9 alluded to this earlier with respect to the

10 things that fall out when you turn the building

11 upside down is really not within our purview.

12 We are looking at the physical elements of the

13 vehicle that uses a fixed guideway system.

14 And by and large, that is rail, although,

15 as Dennis noted earlier, some fixed guideway

16 systems are rubber tire, although we tend

17 in-house to refer as the rail rule and the

18 rubber tire rule as being the other rule. But

19 we do know that there is a little bit of

20 overlap there.

21 And, again, we address new and

22 remanufactured transportation vehicles, new and

23 altered transportation vehicles. And this next

24 part is important to the extent required by

25 regulations issued by DOT and, of course, DOJ
44

1 as well.

2 And this is beginning to sort of show you

3 where there is a dividing line in terms of our

4 responsibility and Justice's and

5 Transportation's. We will write the technical

6 standard.

7 Next slide.

8 And we will write the technical

9 requirements for the vehicle. For example, the

10 size, the location of various elements within

11 the vehicle. The configuration of the vehicle

12 for accessibility and we will make decisions

13 about references, various voluntary consensus

14 standards that may be out there or maybe even

15 federal standards that are out there and

16 available for reference.

17 We will address some elements of scoping.

18 And scoping in our documents is usually the

19 number of required -- elements required to be

20 accessible, usually in comparison to the number

21 of elements not required to be accessible. In

22 other words, something like one in six, one in

23 10 or one on each train.

24 Some of these scoping requirements are

25 already established in the law and we are not
45

1 free to change those.

2 Other types of scoping triggering events

3 are in the federal -- in other agencies

4 regulations and is strictly their purview. We

5 don't get, for example, to say when you get to

6 comply, what the effective date is for

7 compliance for new vehicles or this new

8 standard. That is something that is the

9 responsibility of the enforcing authority.

10 Next slide.

11 A few things that we cannot address. We

12 cannot address policies, practices, procedures

13 or modifications to policies, practices or

14 procedures. Again, although these are required

15 to be nondiscriminatory and you are required to

16 modify policies, practices and procedures to

17 avoid discrimination, that is not the Access

18 Board's responsibility.

19 If you think of us as more on the end of

20 the architecture and the engineering and DOT

21 and DOJ as the enforcers and the attorneys, I

22 think that sort of helps to understand where

23 the line gets drawn between our authority and

24 theirs.

25 We wont be addressing furniture and
46

1 equipment. That is not part of the vehicle.

2 So that also would include things that might

3 be -- elements that might be given only to

4 people with disabilities, auxillary aids for

5 example, a handheld magnifier to read the menu.

6 Other types of auxillary aids that may be

7 required by the ADA but are not subject to our

8 rulemaking; or services, such as interpreting

9 services and whether or not to permit certain

10 types of service animals, for example. These

11 are all outside our purview and not part of our

12 rulemaking.

13 If Paul doesn't send up a red flag when

14 you get into those area, there are a bunch of

15 us here who will. I suspect he will be the

16 first to set off those flags.

17 Understand this is not -- when we do say,

18 you know, "Gee whiz, that is not within our

19 scope," it really is because it is not within

20 our scope, not within our authority, not

21 because there is any resistance on the Access

22 Board part to address these issues. We would

23 like to address them, but we can't.

24 Out of this committee's scope our

25 issues -- on the next slide -- to buses and
47

1 vans, mostly rubber tires. And with respect to

2 the bus rule, you know we have a Notice of

3 Proposed Rulemaking. You also know that

4 Notices of Proposed Rulemaking are our first

5 draft and we are going to publish a final rule

6 in the near future and it may or may not

7 resemble that first draft.

8 The Board does make changes as it goes

9 along in terms of the rules.

10 So I would urge you to think in terms of

11 what accessibility is minimally needed on rail

12 vehicles, or vehicles within your purview and

13 not hang yourself up too much on what is in

14 that proposed rule for other types of vehicles

15 for two reasons: One, they are different.

16 And, secondly, what is publicly available may

17 not survive the rulemaking and may change.

18 And one of the things that we are

19 considering at this point is whether this rail

20 rule would be an entirely separate document,

21 rather than a chapter of the larger document.

22 And we may very well do that. So please don't

23 be too hamstrung by what is in the proposed

24 rule.

25 Next slide.
48

1 One of the things that I would like to

2 cover is what we would like to see in a final

3 report.

4 Obviously we want to see recommendations

5 for revision of any of our current

6 requirements. And I suggest that as you look

7 at the current requirements you ask yourself,

8 "Does it need to change? Do we need to remove

9 it or delete it or should we retain it pretty

10 much as is?"

11 Don't get hung up on the format, please.

12 Access Board staff develop rules all the time.

13 We can develop the format. We will put in your

14 metric equivalents, we will put in your

15 "shalls" and all of that.

16 What we are looking for from you, really,

17 is, you know, we want to pick your brains and

18 we want the meat of your recommendations.

19 Next slide.

20 The next thing we would like to see from

21 you are recommendations to address gaps in the

22 current requirements. First look at the

23 current requirement or second, however order

24 you want to do it in, and ask yourself if they

25 need to change or need to be revised or if they
49

1 should be retained.

2 Secondly, look at where there may be gaps.

3 I'm suggesting you want to address, obviously,

4 mobility access and communication access and

5 any other areas relating to features for people

6 with disabilities that may not currently be

7 served by the rules.

8 So if there are people with disabilities

9 who face barriers that are currently, you know,

10 underserved or not served at all, we want to

11 know about that and we want your

12 recommendations.

13 Next slide.

14 Again, what we would like to see when you

15 develop your recommendations is a discussion of

16 why the particular change is needed. You

17 recommend the change and tell us why the change

18 is needed. Share with us relevant data or

19 other information that you consider as you

20 deliberate what should be in your committee

21 report.

22 It is useful always to let us know a

23 description of who benefits from this change;

24 you know, what types of barriers are you

25 meaning to overcome, who is the target audience
50

1 for this particular change.

2 And it may not be individuals with

3 disabilities. It may be industry. Industry

4 may have a particular regulatory -- see a

5 particular regulatory barrier that you all

6 agree needs to be removed and to the extent

7 that, you know, the intent here is to remove

8 that regulatory barrier, let us know that.

9 And where possible cost considerations.

10 And Aromke will talk more about the regulatory

11 impact on cost considerations.

12 Next slide.

13 I want to say that the Access Board's job

14 is to essentially write minimum guidelines, to

15 develop the minimum appropriate standard to

16 ensure nondiscrimination on the basis of

17 disability. We are, every single one of us,

18 always tempted to do beyond the minimum, you

19 know, the ideal, what really, really solves all

20 the problems.

21 And, again, think about what is minimally

22 necessary to solve the problems for the

23 majority of the people that you are concerned

24 with.

25 We will probably never get to the ideal.
51

1 But you may have some recommendations where you

2 want to say to the public, "You know, when you

3 can, go beyond and here is how we recommend you

4 go beyond," where you have those

5 recommendations and you want to identify them

6 as something more. Good practice, best

7 practice. Please do that and let us know what

8 those are and those can be included in your

9 committee report.

10 The next thing is always a hard thing to

11 say to committees. But we do have existing ADA

12 standards. They have various dimensions in

13 them for wheelchair space, for reach ranges,

14 for what constitutes a protruding object, all

15 of those things.

16 We would encourage you to build on the

17 2010 ADA standards or the DOT 2000 and Linda

18 correct me if I'm wrong. Six?

19 <<<: Four.

20 MS. MAZZ: 2006 standards which is

21 essentially the same technical criteria. If

22 you feel it is necessary to depart from that

23 anthropometry or dimensions, feel free, go

24 ahead, but please give us the reasons. Because

25 when we depart from the existing bedrock
52

1 building block standards, we create an

2 inconsistency in our guidelines that makes them

3 vulnerable for attack, quite bluntly. So we

4 need to have a good reason to go forward.

5 An example for that is in our publics

6 rights-of-way proposed rule. We had proposed a

7 wider route, a wider circulation path for

8 persons with disabilities in the exterior

9 environment. And we have done that because of

10 a number of factors, including crowding on

11 sidewalks, including the desire, at least when

12 you are outdoors, to have a person who may use

13 a mobility device travel next to someone as a

14 companion walking together down the streets

15 rather than walking like ducks one behind the

16 other down the street.

17 Also in certain climates you might be

18 wearing a lot more clothing outside than you

19 would inside.

20 So we had a reason for a wider route in

21 our proposed rule for public rights-of-way.

22 And it was not just arbitrary. Please try to

23 avoid being arbitrary in selecting your

24 recommended dimensions.

25 Next slide.
53

1 So the format. I use the word "plain

2 English" here very advisedly because I don't

3 always get "plain English." If you can simply

4 articulate what it is you want to get at, what

5 the problem, how you want to solve it in your

6 committee report. Please don't try to write a

7 regulation. Just let us know what your

8 recommendation is. Make it clear and the

9 Access Board staff and the Board itself will

10 then massage those words into a format that

11 will work for our rules.

12 Again, supplementary materials, such as

13 illustration or best practices or advisory, my

14 recommendation to you is to not spend too much

15 time on that. Do develop those where time

16 permits, though, and share them with us.

17 And last slide.

18 Thank you. We really do value the

19 expertise around this table. You are all

20 handpicked by our chair and we are really,

21 really proud to have you here and consider

22 Melissa and myself and Lisa and Aromke and

23 others as resources available to you. All of

24 our phone numbers, everybody here at the Access

25 Board, all of our staff are on the website so
54

1 feel free to pick up the phone and give us a

2 call if you have any issues.

3 Of course Paul is your first point of

4 contact. And if you can't reach Paul and you

5 have something you need to discuss that you

6 can't iron out, we are all here. And we do

7 work as a team. So thank you.

8 CHAIR ALTOM: Awesome. Thank you, Marsha.

9 Aromke is up next for us.

10 MS. NOE: Good morning. My name is Aromke

11 Noe. I work at General Counsel's Office and I

12 am here to explain you a little bit about the

13 regulatory impact analysis.

14 So far David Capozzi and Marsha touched on

15 the sort of rulemaking process and talked a

16 little bit about cost and benefit. So I'm

17 hoping to just articulate a little bit more so

18 you have some sense of what we are talking

19 about here.

20 Rose Marie, can you put that --

21 MS. BUNALES: This one?

22 MS. NOE: Yeah. I just put this one here

23 not to expect everybody to read -- I can't read

24 all those things, too small letters -- what

25 rulemaking process looks like.
55

1 The rulemaking is how we make the

2 guidelines, but this process is governed by

3 law, which called the Administration of

4 Procedure Act, APA. So it is not a process we

5 just made up. It is a process governed by

6 laws. And, as David explained, all other

7 federal agencies go through this kind of

8 process.

9 Basically this process explained earlier,

10 we develop a proposed rule and publish in the

11 Federal Register and give the public comments.

12 We review it. We change or we not change. And

13 the final rule. For a chunk but in between

14 is -- in between there are two processes which

15 are OMB review process, which was established

16 by the Executive Order 12A66. It is called the

17 Regulatory Planning and Review. It was issued

18 by President Clinton in 1993.

19 The purpose of that Executive Order was to

20 enhance coordination with respect to new and

21 old regulations and have it more accessible and

22 open to public. So invite a lot of public

23 input in the rulemaking, federal rulemaking

24 process.

25 But along with that, there is an OMB
56

1 review process. So once agency develop the

2 rules, they need to go to OMB to show OMB why

3 we develop the new rules and why we need to

4 change the current rules and how much that cost

5 and who benefits. So it is OMB's job to look

6 at those things and review it and this is when

7 we get -- once we approve, we get the publish

8 in Federal Register. You can see in the

9 website, directinfo.gov, that explains the

10 regulatory process.

11 Currently we are in Step 1 and 2. You

12 guys trying to deliberate what the kind of

13 policies we should come up with. So once you

14 develop recommendations then, as Marsha said,

15 the people here will write a language, look

16 like regulation language, come up with the

17 rules.

18 And then we will go to OMB for review

19 before we publish. But at that time what we

20 need is an impact analysis, which is looking at

21 the impact of regulations, impact of the rules

22 we come up with, both cost and benefits. And

23 so as you talk about type of recommendations

24 you are thinking about, I would like you to ask

25 you to think about what are the costs of the
57

1 things that we are proposed to change.

2 Sometimes it can be straightforward, but

3 many times it is not straightforward and

4 usually the straightforward the cost would be

5 like, you know, unit cost like the microphones,

6 you know, the unit cost of the microphones for

7 the room and you multiply by how many we need

8 and that is the cost. A lot of the times it is

9 not that straightforward.

10 Sometimes the fact some are depending on

11 the situation, some microphones -- all of them,

12 so you don't want to change all at once, for

13 example.

14 But we do not expect you to know all the

15 cost. But if you do know the cost, then please

16 consider to discuss in your report. And also

17 sometimes if you don't know the cost but you

18 think you know where we can find that kind of

19 cost, then let us know, what are the sources,

20 where the data source out there or if you think

21 it would be good for us to talk to some

22 manufacturers or some other people or you think

23 have a recommendation to pursue that cost where

24 we should look, then please tell us. That

25 would be helpful for us. When we go to OMB
58

1 without that piece, the impact analysis piece,

2 we cannot go to OMB.

3 The process is long and each process needs

4 to be complete.

5 When we put the packages together without

6 the cost and benefit, it won't be complete. So

7 that means we need to finish it.

8 Sometimes we won't know cost, so "Access

9 Board, you go ahead and find it." We can find

10 it, but it will take us a while to do it. If

11 we want the process to go timely and have the

12 rules you want to see sooner, we need to have

13 that type of information.

14 Also, as Marsha talked about, in terms of

15 benefit, to make sure they are full benefits

16 and how they benefit and tries to articulate

17 it. If you have anecdotal stories or something

18 that describe very concretely, will be very

19 useful. It will help somebody -- sort of

20 general assertions. So the extent that is

21 possible, if you can think about the cost of

22 your proposals and benefits of your proposal

23 will be useful.

24 MS. BUNALES: Mr. Chairman, if I may, I

25 have a question from the CART chat room. And
59

1 the question was, "How do people following CART

2 see the presentations on the screen?" And the

3 answer is we do not have the capability at this

4 point, unfortunately.

5 So we hope to have that resolved at some

6 point. But at the moment, no, we don't -- if

7 you are sitting on CART, you cannot see the

8 presentations.

9 MS. NOE: For this particular map, I put

10 up the visual aid is available at REGINFO.gov.

11 If anyone want to see the detail, they can do

12 that.

13 MR. BEATTY: All the presentations will be

14 put on the advisory committee website so you

15 can eventually take a look at those. They

16 should be up within a week.

17 CHAIR ALTOM: That is it?

18 MS. NOE: That is it.

19 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, very much. A

20 couple of quick things before we move on.

21 We had another member come in. Ross,

22 would you like to take a moment and say hello

23 and introduce yourself and please use the mic.

24 We give you a test right off the bat.

25 MR. CAPON: I'm Ross Capon and I'm
60

1 president of the National Association of

2 Railroad Passengers.

3 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, very much.

4 Another housekeeping piece. This room is

5 small. We have mics everywhere. We pick up a

6 lot of stuff and thus far we are pretty good.

7 Make sure to put your cellphones on silence, if

8 you have not done so already. If you need to

9 take a call, I believe there are small

10 conference rooms right behind me. And also

11 avoid discussions in the middle of the hallway

12 because it is kind of a congested area too. So

13 if we can move here in the back to have

14 conversations, that would be much appreciated.

15 Next on our agenda, which is up here on

16 the board, we have our Federal Advisory

17 Committee Act overview and have Lisa Fairhall

18 who will present that to us. Thank you.

19 MS. FAIRHALL: Good morning. How many of

20 you around the table have participated as

21 members on federal advisory committees in the

22 past? Can I see a show of hands? We have a

23 pretty good number of folks who have been

24 through this already and that is great because

25 I know we will all rely on you with your
61

1 familiarity of the process to help this run

2 smoothly.

3 I will give a little overview. It will be

4 a recap for those who have already been through

5 the process and hopefully some new information

6 for those of you who are new to the process.

7 What is the Federal Advisory Committee

8 Act? FACA, as we like to call it, is the

9 statute that govern the statute and

10 organization of committees established by

11 federal agencies to obtain advice from

12 nonfederal individuals or entities.

13 The act was designed to fulfill two basic

14 purposes; to enhance public accountability of

15 advisory committees and it does this by

16 controlling the undue influence of special

17 interest by balancing committee membership, and

18 by ensuring that public access to committee

19 deliberations is maximized.

20 The second purpose behind the Federal

21 Advisory Committee Act was to reduce wasteful

22 expenditure on advisory committees and it does

23 it by laying out guidelines for overall

24 management of committee activities and manage

25 controls.
62

1 At any given time there are over 700

2 federal advisory committees in operation in the

3 federal government with thousands of members

4 issuing tens of thousands of recommendations on

5 federal policy on grants and almost any issue

6 that you can imagine.

7 Federal Advisory Committees are absolutely

8 critical to bringing public input into forming

9 public policy decisions. You are truly

10 participating in your federal government when

11 you spend your time with us. And for that, as

12 folks have said, you are absolutely critical to

13 our process. And almost every federal agency

14 uses Federal Advisory Committees at some point

15 to help them improve the work they do for

16 citizens.

17 An advisory committee is any board,

18 committee, commission, conference, panel, task

19 force or other similar group that is

20 established by statute or established or

21 utilized by the President or agency official

22 for the purpose of obtaining advice or

23 recommendations and has at least one member who

24 is not a federal guy. And clearly here we have

25 a large representation of the public. You are
63

1 nonfederal members.

2 So if a group has been established or

3 utilized by the federal government, has a

4 nonfederal member, even one, and provides

5 advice and recommendations to a federal

6 official, you are probably an advisory

7 committees and you are probably governed by the

8 Federal Advisory Committee Act.

9 In creating the membership of an advisory

10 committee, the agency has to make sure that the

11 membership is balanced relevant to the issue,

12 the committee will address and no registered

13 lobbyist may participate.

14 We are going to go over the guidelines

15 governing how the committee will conduct its

16 business a little later today when you take up

17 the protocols and operating procedures. I

18 think that is probably the next item on the

19 agenda. I wanted to give you a nutshell

20 overview.

21 Advisory committee members are required to

22 be open and announced to the public 15 days in

23 advance with very limited exception. Members

24 of the public may write public statements and

25 address the committees if agency guidelines
64

1 permit. We have left time for public comment

2 this afternoon.

3 The agency approves the agenda for each

4 advisory committee meeting and authorizes the

5 committee to meet and it is our designated

6 federal officer, Paul Beatty, who will be

7 performing that function for us.

8 The DFO must attend all the meetings of

9 the committee and subcommittees. The DFO is

10 responsible for preparing minutes of each

11 meeting and making them available to the

12 public.

13 Advisory committees have no operational

14 authority. You exist solely to make

15 recommendations to the host federal agency.

16 And, as Marsha outlined earlier, that is what

17 your task will be through your consensus and

18 your reports.

19 Now you are all members. Each member is

20 appointed by and shares at the pleasure of the

21 Access Board. The appointment is personal to

22 the member and is not transferable.

23 As I mentioned earlier, the membership of

24 committees and subcommittees must be balanced

25 in terms of the point of view represented and
65

1 the functions to be performed by the committee.

2 And as members you have responsibilities.

3 The short list is you are responsible to attend

4 and actively participate in all meetings,

5 either in person or teleconference, come to

6 meetings prepared and follow the agreed

7 operating procedures and keep the purpose of

8 the committee in mind, be aware of your role.

9 You are serving as representative members and

10 you must reflect the perspective of your

11 stakeholder group.

12 Predecisional nonpublic information of the

13 work of the committee cannot be released to the

14 public. If you have a question whether you can

15 share particular information relating to the

16 committee's work, please consult Paul or me or

17 other members of the Access Board staff.

18 As representatives, you are not federal

19 employees and therefore you are not subject to

20 the federal ethics laws. But often questions

21 come up about what you can do or can't do or

22 you can say or can't say. Please don't

23 hesitate to call me or Paul if you have any

24 questions. And since many of you have already

25 been through this, I think that is where I will
66

1 stop, unless anybody has any questions.

2 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, very much. We

3 have our agenda up on the wall and I will read

4 it quickly again for those who may not be able

5 to read that.

6 We have gone through our welcome, our

7 overview of committee, our Federal Advisory

8 Committee Act, number 3. Number 4, review and

9 approval of protocol, potential new membership,

10 establish future meetings date, review of

11 current rail guidelines and public comment

12 periods. And for tomorrow from 9:00 to 3:00 we

13 will be doing committee work, administration,

14 new business, public comment period and we will

15 be adjourning.

16 The note at the very end is what I wanted

17 to address, "Lunch on your own at a time each

18 day favorable to committee work." We started

19 at 10:00 and it is a quarter to 12:00 now.

20 Entertain comments from the group. We can take

21 a break now for 10 or 15 minutes and come back

22 and work another hour and go to lunch. Or we

23 can do lunch now and come back and knock out

24 the afternoon from 1:00 to 5:00. Anybody have

25 preferences on how we would proceed? I have
67

1 one. Ross, yeah?

2 MR. CAPON: Work another half hour or so

3 and then take lunch.

4 CHAIR ALTOM: Go to 12:30. Does anybody

5 need a break now or do we just keep hammering

6 on through? Feel free to go.

7 MS. BUNALES: Mr. Chairman, the CART says

8 she needs a break.

9 CHAIR ALTOM: Perfect. Let's take until

10 12:00. It is about 12 minutes and split the

11 middle of that. We will take a short 12-minute

12 break and give our CART services a break and we

13 will be back at 12:00 straight up.

14 (Whereupon, a recess was taken

15 from 11:48 a.m. to 12:03 pm

16 CHAIR ALTOM: If we could reconvene, I

17 would appreciate it. Just as a reminder, we

18 will work for another half hour and take our

19 lunch break at 12:30.

20 Thank you, all. What we have next on our

21 agenda is to look at the review and approval of

22 protocols and we are fortunate to have Rose who

23 will go over it with us today. And I will turn

24 it over to Rose.

25 MS. BUNALES: Okay. Before I go on, I
68

1 just wanted to recognize on listening on the

2 phone is Frank Maldari, MTA Long Island.

3 CHAIR ALTOM: Welcome, Frank.

4 And what we will do here today with Rose

5 when we go through these, we just put them up

6 on the screen at the side and also emailed to

7 everyone in advance. We will look at our

8 mission, our interest represented on the

9 committee. And as we go through each of these

10 we can ask the group are these acceptable as a

11 group or do we need to have any revisions.

12 Having said that, Rose.

13 MS. BUNALES: Okay. Number one, Mission.

14 "The advisory committee will make

15 recommendations to the Access Board on revising

16 and updating the portion of the Americans with

17 Disabilities Act Accessibility Guidelines for

18 Transportation Vehicles that addresses

19 passenger vehicles that use fixed guideway

20 systems (e.g., rapid rail, light rail, commuter

21 rail, and intercity rail). The Board's

22 guidelines are codified at 36 CFR part 1192.

23 The guidelines contain minimum scoping and

24 technical criteria to ensure that

25 transportation vehicles are accessible to and
69

1 usable by individuals with disabilities. The

2 guidelines apply to the acquisition of new,

3 used, and remanufactured transportation

4 vehicles, and the remanufacture of existing

5 transportation vehicles to the extent required

6 by regulations issued by the Department of

7 Transportation. The guidelines for

8 transportation vehicles using fixed guideway

9 systems have not been revised since established

10 in 1991, 56 FR 45530. The guidelines for

11 transportation vehicles that address buses,

12 over-the-road buses, and vans have been the

13 subject of another rulemaking project of the

14 Access Board, 75 FR 43748, July 26, 2010, and

15 these types of vehicles are not included in the

16 scope of this advisory committee work."

17 Any comment?

18 CHAIR ALTOM: Everybody clear? Perfect.

19 We will keep going.

20 MS. BUNALES: "Number 2: Interests

21 Represented on Committee. The committee is

22 comprised of organizations appointed by the

23 Chair of the Access Board to represent the

24 interests of groups affected by the revised and

25 updated guidelines, including manufacturers of
70

1 transportation vehicles that use fixed guideway

2 systems, transportation providers that operate

3 fixed guideway systems, individuals with

4 disabilities, and other interested parties.

5 The Federal Railroad Administration has been

6 appointed as an ex-officio member of the

7 committee."

8 CHAIR ALTOM: Any comment or discussion on

9 point number 2? All in agreement? Three.

10 MS. BUNALES: "Number 3: Committee

11 Members and Alternate Members. Each

12 organization appointed to the committee will

13 designate a member and an alternate member to

14 represent the organization on the committee

15 subject to approval by the Chair of the Access

16 Board." Discussion?

17 "Number 4: Additional Committee Members.

18 Additional committee members may be added to

19 represent a stakeholder group which is not

20 adequately represented and/or to achieve

21 balance of points of view among committee

22 membership. Additional committee members may

23 only be added during the first meeting of the

24 committee. Chairperson of the Access Board may

25 consider adding additional members 1) that
71

1 receive the vote of three quarters of the

2 advisory committee membership, or 2) for

3 committee balance. Additional committee

4 members added through this process shall begin

5 service upon appointment by the Chairperson of

6 the Access Board."

7 Comment?

8 <<<: I have a question and, that is, does

9 the second sentence, "may only be added during

10 the first meeting of the committee," does that

11 modify the entire paragraph or is the intent of

12 the last two sentences like a new separate

13 paragraph?

14 MR. BEATTY: It applies to the whole

15 paragraph. This is the one shot.

16 <<<: So whatever means the one shot?

17 MR. BEATTY: Today is the day for those

18 who have come to us.

19 And another comment I was going to make,

20 one of the criteria that Lisa mentioned, all

21 members have to be certified they are not a

22 federally registered lobbyist, which everyone

23 here at the table by various means have sent

24 me.

25 Because some people submitted nominations
72

1 many months ago and it is possible to have

2 become a federally registered lobbyist,

3 committee members there is a form you need to

4 fill out. The form is basically for the

5 committee members certification of not being a

6 federally registered lobbyist. It quotes from

7 the President's memorandum and it says, "I

8 certify I'm not a federally registered lobbyist

9 and agree not to become a federally registered

10 lobbyist while I serve." And it asks you to

11 put in the name you represent.

12 If you become a federally registered

13 lobbyist, you are free to do that, just that

14 you have to resign your membership. The

15 organization cannot just automatically give

16 somebody a stop, unless of course your

17 alternate jumps up.

18 If you take on that duty, federally

19 registered lobbyist, your organization has to

20 appoint somebody new. If it is not the

21 alternate, we have to go through the process of

22 getting our Chair of the Access Board's

23 approval.

24 For a paper chain, make sure if your

25 alternate is in the room, make sure they filled
73

1 this out. For those I have not given you a

2 blank copy to fill out, I will come to you or

3 come to me.

4 Later when we talk about subcommittees, I

5 have another spiel to give, but I will wait

6 until we give that part of the protocol. As

7 soon as you fill it out, give it to me or to

8 Rose.

9 CHAIR ALTOM: Additional comments on

10 Number 4?

11 MR. HUNTER: I noticed the text of this

12 section is different than the operating

13 procedures that were sent out by email sometime

14 in the last couple of months in preparation of

15 this meeting. At least the version I have does

16 not have point number 2 that says, "For

17 committee balance."

18 I'm just wondering what it was that

19 generated the revision to the proposed

20 procedures.

21 CHAIR ALTOM: The one you got was for the

22 October meeting and obviously in reviewing it,

23 we said whoops. In order to form the committee

24 there are stakeholder groups and, secondly, we

25 have to assure there is proper balance and we
74

1 have to let the committee know those are the

2 two criteria.

3 You have seven individuals that will look

4 for membership. If they get appointed, the

5 Board has to make the analysis "is this

6 proper." If only one is added, we have to make

7 sure there is proper balance. We have to make

8 sure one group does not have 1/3 of the

9 committee. If this were an advisory committee

10 and they were all made up of manufacturers,

11 from the public's perspective, that would not

12 be a proper balance.

13 MR. HUNTER: And that makes sense. That

14 is to a large degree what I assumed. I guess

15 what I assume, since additional members may

16 only be added at this meeting today or

17 tomorrow, how would the committee deal with an

18 imbalance if one is created if we only have

19 today or tomorrow to have new members?

20 MR. BEATTY: This is the way we plan. We

21 have a vote this afternoon -- mic is coming and

22 going. We plan to have a vote this afternoon

23 on the seven. Right now the protocol, which

24 you can change -- I mean this is your operating

25 procedure. Some things you cannot change, like
75

1 the mission, sorry, that is done. But many

2 other parts of the protocol you can change. So

3 right now the draft protocol says 3/4 committee

4 vote to become -- first stage of becoming a

5 member. And then we present it to our Chair of

6 the Board for approval.

7 Now, we don't know what the outcome of the

8 vote is going to be. We don't know if all

9 seven are going to be appointed or none or

10 three. So we need to first see what the result

11 is and then discuss the outcome. And that

12 would be occurring after the meeting was

13 staffed.

14 So it may be tomorrow we would tell you

15 the outcome or it may mean there is another

16 vote. We are not really sure. Because we need

17 to know who crosses the 3/4 line. Our goal is

18 proper balance.

19 Yes, Marsha?

20 MS. MAZZ: Just one thing in response to

21 what I think was the intent of the question.

22 There will be ways for people who are not on

23 this committee to participate should this

24 committee develop subcommittees. So all is not

25 lost if someone is not appointed because if
76

1 this group does break into subcommittees, we

2 generally welcome anyone to participate in a

3 subcommittee.

4 MR. BEATTY: Remember, you have to agree

5 to these protocols. We put it in here as a

6 draft. This is your one place.

7 Now, think of it from the Board's

8 perspective here. We say we are going to be

9 meeting sometimes and if somebody new shows up

10 that has not been involved in the process, you

11 know, our Chair would be hesitant to have them

12 join. Not impossible.

13 We advertised this. We received all the

14 organizations here, submitted their nominations

15 in the time period and we made our selections

16 based on the nominations received and we

17 started the process.

18 We are very concerned at some point

19 Meeting 3 some new organization comes out of

20 the blue and wants to join and they don't have,

21 shall we say, the discussion background that

22 some of the deliberations went through.

23 This protocol is up to you. So we are

24 putting in there this meeting today is one that

25 somebody can submit nominations.
77

1 If you want to change it, that is up to

2 the committee.

3 MR. HUNTER: I have been part of a number

4 of committees that have developed standards,

5 many of which have been ultimately incorporated

6 into rulemaking. So consistency and the makeup

7 of the committee throughout the process is very

8 important. It has also been important to allow

9 the committee to change and evolve to reflect

10 the true makeup of the committee to support the

11 mission.

12 Maybe one thing to consider is future

13 committees may be considered for future

14 membership if deemed appropriate by the

15 Chairperson, or something of that effect.

16 Since it's the Chair that has the role of

17 approving the appointment of the new members,

18 perhaps it gives us a little bit of flexibility

19 if we do end up with an imbalance or if we do

20 find we have a little bit of shift in need as

21 we work forward in the standard development.

22 If the chairperson decides that bringing

23 someone in is appropriate and beneficial to the

24 committee, this would give them some

25 flexibility to do so. Just my thought.
78

1 MR. BEATTY: Well, it's the committee's

2 decision. It is not the Access Board protocol;

3 it is your procedures for operations.

4 So, Dennis? I'm sorry.

5 MR. CANNON: I just want to reiterate

6 something that Marsha said and that is in my

7 experience, both being a DFO for some of these

8 committees and participating on them. That not

9 being a member of the actual committee itself

10 is not a block to participating. And sometimes

11 when subcommittees are created which people,

12 who are not on the committee, can join.

13 I have done, sometimes, the majority of

14 the work. So it is not necessary for you to be

15 on the committee to have your voice heard and

16 to have good input.

17 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

18 Justin?

19 MR. VONASHEK: What is the current

20 committee balance right now? Do we know that?

21 Is it leaning one way or the other?

22 MR. BEATTY: We think it is balanced, that

23 one group has no more than roughly a third. So

24 adding new people depending on who is

25 added --we want to evaluate and let you know
79

1 what we consider.

2 MR. HART: I just want to reiterate, the

3 Access Board does extensive outreach to a

4 variety of groups. I have personally

5 outreached to some of you in this room. I was

6 personally surprised that a couple of

7 organizations did not put their names in. That

8 was surprising from my perspective. So balance

9 is key and I will go with what the committee

10 decides. Please know that we do extensive

11 outreach.

12 I know my role. We publicize our needs

13 and we let our members know on the steering

14 committee.

15 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, Chris.

16 Any other comment on Point Number 4?

17 MS. BUNALES: So what are we doing with

18 Mr. -- is it Hunter? to add additional --

19 CHAIR ALTOM: We have not decided yet.

20 Stan, are you making that kind of in a

21 form of a motion, that we add the additional

22 language there that may be considered at a

23 later date?

24 MR. HUNTER: Yes, Mr. Chairman. I think

25 there should -- I think I would like to make a
80

1 motion that the language be revised to say that

2 the Chairperson has the ability to bring

3 forward additional members for consideration by

4 the group for membership of the advisory

5 committee if deemed necessary for balance. I

6 would like to propose that as a motion to give

7 us a little bit of flexibility to adjust the

8 makeup of this group after this meeting today

9 and tomorrow.

10 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, very much.

11 Do we have a motion? Do we have a second?

12 MR. SAUCIER: I certainly second that.

13 CHAIR ALTOM: Stan and Stan.

14 MR. SAUCIER: There are probably only two

15 of us in the country and we are in the same

16 room.

17 (Chorus of Laughter)

18 CHAIR ALTOM: We have a motion and a

19 second. Any further discussion?

20 We are looking at a semantic issue. Would

21 it be "applicants" or "members"?

22 MS. GOLDEN: I'm moving around as usual.

23 I don't get the motion. Either the Chair

24 appoints them and then they are a member, in

25 which case I don't know about the language of
81

1 consideration by the committee, or the Chair

2 has the ability to forward additional

3 applicants for consideration by the committee

4 and the committee can appoint them.

5 It seems like if today -- I would hope

6 this whole voting thing is tomorrow. But

7 anyway, if at this meeting to add a member

8 requires a vote, a high vote, right, a super,

9 super majority I don't know why future

10 additions would also require the same. The

11 language would be, "The Chair has the ability

12 to bring forth an applicant for consideration

13 to become a member." If I'm mixed up, let me

14 know.

15 MR. HUNTER: I think, Marilyn, you are

16 correct. That was my intention. The

17 Chairperson would be able to bring forward

18 applicants that would then be considered for

19 appointment to the group, by the group under

20 the same 3/4 of the advisory committee

21 membership. Gives us the flexibility to do

22 that beyond meeting today or tomorrow.

23 MR. BEATTY: By "chairperson" you are

24 referring to the chairperson of the Board or

25 the chairperson of the advisory committee?
82

1 Ideally, I think we would like the process

2 or at least the Chair of our Board would like,

3 if the committee feels an applicant warrants

4 inclusion, that the Chair of the Board would

5 like to make the decision on whether they

6 should join, keeping in mind our

7 responsibilities under the FACA act.

8 So maybe as a point of discussion, is that

9 the Chair of the committee can bring an

10 applicant -- somebody comes to the Chair and

11 says, "I think I should join." The Chair

12 thinks about it, meaning Billy, he thinks,

13 "Okay, there is a good argument here." He

14 presents the person to the full committee and

15 the full committee makes a vote. And assuming

16 you cross whatever line you want to make, 3/4,

17 then that person, the staff would bring the

18 name to the Board Chair for ultimate approval.

19 MR. HUNTER: So the Board Chair would make

20 the determination whether the additional

21 applicant would be appointed to the committee?

22 MR. BEATTY: Just like we did for this

23 committee. Staff made recommendations to our

24 Board Chair. There is going to be seven people

25 voted on. All seven may get 3/4 of the vote.
83

1 And then we have to go through our Board Chair.

2 Because under FACA, I believe it's the head of

3 the agency that appoints somebody, not the

4 committee members or Billy.

5 So I guess it is more the process and --

6 sounds like people want to be able to provide

7 new members to the committee. Is that a sense

8 that is correct? Okay. Marsha?

9 MS. MAZZ: It is the Board's

10 responsibility to maintain balance in

11 compliance with the Federal Advisory Committee

12 Act. So ultimately I think the responsibility

13 for appointment lies with the Board.

14 But the Chair would, obviously, seriously

15 consider any recommendations this group would

16 make and would make every effort to accommodate

17 them.

18 MR. BEATTY: But I'm assuming our Chair

19 would want to let this group make the decision

20 first --

21 MS. MAZZ: But the decision is a decision

22 to recommend to the Board Chair, not the

23 decision to appoint.

24 MR. BEATTY: Correct. So sounds like

25 people want to be able to add new members.
84

1 So the question is, how is a

2 recommendation brought before this committee

3 that makes a decision and sends the

4 recommendation they desire on to the Access

5 Board's Chair?

6 MR. CAPOZZI: And how often.

7 MR. BEATTY: And how often as opposed to

8 just once, as shown here.

9 MR. WEISMAN: I think that, you know, this

10 new member issue is a matter of balance. So it

11 would be a matter of the Chair determining the

12 balance needs to be creating or reestablished

13 and that somebody that they may already know or

14 that any member of the committee would be able

15 to suggest might meet that criteria. And, of

16 course, I think the committee Chair would need

17 to make the determination this person actually

18 meets this criteria and then present it to the

19 vote.

20 CHAIR ALTOM: To the committee and then

21 back to the Chair of the Access Board?

22 MR. WEISMAN: Right. How many times have

23 we actually sat down and agreed to have a vote

24 on something. It could take months to do that,

25 if we don't do that in a process when we know
85

1 there are people missing or -- not missing or,

2 you know, resigned or unable to continue with

3 the committee, and needs to be reestablished.

4 At that point a message would need to go out to

5 say we were considering new members of this

6 particular category in order to rebalance the

7 representation and whatever procedure you use

8 from that point forward.

9 MR. BEATTY: I was going to say to speed

10 us up and also because we are getting near

11 lunch, I got a sense here that the committee

12 wants some methodology to include new members.

13 So how about staff of the Access Board work on

14 paragraph 4 and bring it back to you so we can

15 move on from there.

16 MR. HUNTER: I think that is acceptable.

17 Thank you, Paul.

18 CHAIR ALTOM: Are you agreeable to rescind

19 my motion?

20 MR. HUNTER: I'm agreeable to rescind my

21 motion pending rewriting of Section 4 by Access

22 Board staff.

23 CHAIR ALTOM: We will have this brought to

24 us later as the staff will work on that. We

25 move to Number 5, Committee Member
86

1 Responsibility.

2 MS. BUNALES: "Number 5: Committee member

3 responsibilities. Committee members will

4 attend committee meetings, participate fully

5 and openly in discussions, exchange information

6 to the fullest extent possible, consider

7 alternatives, and make a good faith effort to

8 reach consensus on recommendations for the

9 revision and updated of the guidelines. When

10 alternate members attend committee meetings,

11 they have the same responsibilities as

12 committee members."

13 CHAIR ALTOM: Delete the "need."

14 MS. BUNALES: Who wrote this thing?

15 (Chorus of Laughter)

16 MR. BEATTY: I did.

17 CHAIR ALTOM: Any comment or questions of

18 Number 5? Hearing none.

19 MS. BUNALES: "Number 6: Attendance at

20 meetings. Committee members should attend

21 committee meetings in person. If committee

22 members cannot attend committee meetings in

23 person, they may attend by teleconference.

24 Alternate members are encouraged to attend

25 committee meetings. If an alternate member
87

1 does not attend committee meetings, the

2 committee member should brief the alternate

3 member on the committee discussions. If an

4 organization is not represented by a committee

5 member or an alternate member at two

6 consecutive committee meetings, the Chair of

7 the Access Board may remove the organization

8 and its members from the committee."

9 CHAIR ALTOM: Straightforward. Comments?

10 Carry on.

11 MS. BUNALES: "Technical advisors:

12 Committee members may be accompanied by

13 technical advisors. Technical advisors may

14 participate in committee discussions. If the

15 discussion becomes unwieldy, any committee

16 member may request that technical advisors be

17 allowed to speak only if permitted by the Chair

18 of the committee."

19 CHAIR ALTOM: Marilyn, is your hand up or

20 you're thinking with your hand? Okay.

21 MS. BUNALES: "Number 8: Designated

22 Federal Official, DFO. In accordance with 41

23 CFR 102-3.120, the DFO must, for both the full

24 committee and subcommittees, approve the call

25 of the meetings, approve the agenda, and attend
88

1 the meetings."

2 CHAIR ALTOM: That is CFR. So we are

3 good. Moving on.

4 MS. BUNALES: "Number 9: Committee Chair.

5 The Chair of the committee will consult with

6 the DFO regarding meeting agendas, will chair

7 committee meetings as directed by Board chair,

8 and (per 41 CFR 102-3.165) will certify the

9 accuracy of the minutes of committee meetings

10 within 90 calendar days of the meeting."

11 CHAIR ALTOM: Awesome.

12 MR. CAPOZZI: Just add before Board Chair.

13 CHAIR ALTOM: Question, Dennis?

14 MR. CANNON: I have a question. Are you

15 referring to -- I'm assuming you are going to

16 use the CART. Are we talking about real

17 minutes versus meeting summaries? I mean, they

18 are different. We usually in the past have

19 done minute -- I mean, meeting summaries, which

20 explain the points, as opposed to all the

21 motions made by John and seconded by... how

22 detailed?

23 MR. BEATTY: You will see them when you

24 see the draft to look at.

25 MS. MAZZ: Dennis, it will be a summary.
89

1 CHAIR ALTOM: Any other comments or

2 questions?

3 MS. BUNALES: Committee Meetings, Number

4 10. "Committee meetings will be conducted in

5 accordance with Federal Advisory Committee

6 Management Regulations at 41 CFR Part 102-3,

7 Subpart D. Committee meetings are expected to

8 be held in the Access Board Conference Room.

9 Notice of committee meetings will be published

10 in the Federal Register at least 15 calendar

11 days prior to each meeting. Committee meetings

12 will be open to the public. During each day of

13 committee meetings, there will be time for

14 public comment. Persons attending committee

15 meetings are requested to refrain from using

16 perfume, cologne, and other fragrances for the

17 comfort of other participants."

18 CHAIR ALTOM: All in agreement?

19 MS. BUNALES: "Number 11: Meeting

20 Agendas. The DFO will prepare agendas for

21 committee meetings in consultation with the

22 Chair of the committee. A summary of the

23 agenda topics to be discussed at each committee

24 meeting will be included in the Federal

25 Register notice announcing the meeting."
90

1 CHAIR ALTOM: Keep going.

2 MS. BUNALES: "Number 12: Agenda

3 Materials. Committee members should submit

4 agenda materials in MS Word format to the DFO

5 at least five business days before committee

6 meetings. Agenda materials will be posted on

7 the committee web page in advance of the

8 meeting. Agenda materials will be provided in

9 accessible formats for committee members and

10 alternate members who request such formats.

11 Committee members who handout written materials

12 at committee meetings shall provide a

13 sufficient number of copies for committee

14 members, including accessible formats for

15 committee members and alternate members who

16 request such formats.

17 "Number 13: Quorum. A quorum of two

18 thirds of the committee membership is required

19 to make recommendations on behalf of the full

20 committee. If a committee member is absent and

21 an alternate member is present at a meeting,

22 the alternate member is counted for purposes of

23 establishing a quorum. In the absence of a

24 quorum, the committee may meet for the purpose

25 of discussion, but may not make recommendations
91

1 on behalf of the full committee.

2 "Number 14: Minutes. The DFO will

3 prepare minutes of committee meetings. The

4 committee will review the minutes at its next

5 meeting and the Chair of the committee will

6 certify the accuracy of the minutes. Where the

7 next meeting is more than 90 days, the approval

8 of the minutes will be conducted by email. An

9 email will be sent to committee members (and

10 alternates) who attended the meeting. 'A

11 number of' business days will be allowed for

12 review and comment. Committee members must

13 respond supporting the minutes or noting

14 corrections. Once a majority of committee

15 members approve the minutes, the minutes will

16 be considered approved by the committee.

17 Approved minutes of committee meetings will be

18 posted on the committee web page."

19 And there is a blank before "business

20 days."

21 MR. BEATTY: This was all because having

22 Billy certify minutes within 90 days. Of

23 course a lot of this was written back when we

24 were going to be in October. So in those

25 circumstances -- and we have not yet planned
92

1 out the next three meetings. If we don't have

2 more than 90 days between meetings, that is not

3 a problem. If we have more than 90 days, the

4 question is: How much time is a reasonable

5 amount of time for committee members to receive

6 the draft minutes, make any comments and

7 respond back and move toward approving them via

8 the email process?

9 So that is why we have terms of number of

10 days. Are we talking about two weeks? Five

11 days? And essentially what is good for

12 committee members juggling other

13 responsibilities.

14 And we talked about minute summary.

15 Obviously we would like as much detail in the

16 minutes because going through the transcript is

17 time typical for two days.

18 So everybody is thinking of lunch, I can

19 see that. So five days.

20 <<<: Five business days seems reasonable.

21 MR. HUNTER: Ten business days. Five days

22 that is one week. How about 10 business days?

23 MR. BEATTY: Ten business days? No?

24 (Simultaneous Discussion)

25 MR. BEATTY: We have some people like
93

1 five, some people like 10.

2 <<<: Seven.

3 (Chorus of Laughter)

4 MR. BEATTY: Seven business days?

5 MR. SLAUGHTER: I think the concern I

6 sense from Stanton is one of my own. For those

7 of us involved in programs with our companies

8 that send us away for five days at a time, five

9 business days can be difficult. If you can

10 extend seven business days, 10 would be ideal,

11 but that is my opinion.

12 <<<: I support 10 days.

13 <<<: Seven.

14 CHAIR ALTOM: I think by consensus I think

15 we have 10. Everybody is nodding in agreement.

16 Ten days, perfect. Thank you.

17 MS. BUNALES: Number 14 now does say "10

18 business days will be allowed for review and

19 comment."

20 "Number 15: Subcommittees. The committee

21 may establish subcommittees to discuss matters

22 within the scope of the committee's mission

23 subject to approval by the DFO. Subcommittees

24 will report their recommendations to the full

25 committee for discussion. Persons who are not
94

1 committee members or alternate members may

2 participate as subcommittee members.

3 Subcommittee members will be appointed by the

4 Chair of the full committee in consultation

5 with the DFO. Subcommittees will be chaired by

6 a full committee member selected by the

7 subcommittee. Subcommittees may meet between

8 full committee meetings or at full committee

9 meetings. Subcommittee chairs will submit

10 subcommittee meeting schedules and agendas to

11 the DFO for approval, if meetings are scheduled

12 in advance of full committee meetings or

13 outside the dates of the full committee

14 meetings. Notice of subcommittee meetings will

15 be published in advance of meetings on the

16 committee web page when subcommittees meet

17 between full committee meetings, and in the

18 Federal Register when subcommittees are

19 scheduled to meet during the dates of the full

20 committee meetings. If a subcommittee meets by

21 teleconference, the teleconference number will

22 be posted on the committee web page in advance

23 of the meeting and the teleconference will be

24 open to the public. The same procedures that

25 apply to committee agenda materials will apply
95

1 to subcommittee agenda materials. The DFO or

2 alternate DFO must (per 41 CFR 102-3.120) be

3 present at subcommittee meetings."

4 MR. BEATTY: This doesn't apply to

5 committee members and alternates. Members of

6 the public who are not federal employees, if

7 you plan to participate -- Billy has said we

8 will be running an open meeting. So if you

9 plan to participate either at the full

10 committee or in the subcommittees, which the

11 protocols allow pretty much open participation,

12 there is a form back there you need to sign

13 basically saying I'm not a federally registered

14 lobbyist. You need to give that to me or Rose.

15 So if you are out there in the audience and

16 plan to participate, that is for you.

17 MR. CANNON: I have a question. It says,

18 "The DFO or alternate DFO shall participate in

19 the subcommittee meetings." I don't know who

20 the alternate is. But at any rate, that

21 implies you can only have a couple of

22 subcommittees.

23 MR. BEATTY: Obviously there is a limit to

24 how many subcommittees conceptually the Access

25 Board can support. Right now I have been
96

1 designated by the Chair of the Board to be the

2 DFO.

3 However, if we have two subcommittees

4 conceptually or three running at the same time,

5 depending on how you want to address the issue,

6 the Chair of the Access Board can appoint

7 other, say, alternate DFO. It would be one or

8 the other, if we break into subcommittees that

9 are meeting at the same time.

10 CHAIR ALTOM: Any other questions?

11 Concerns regarding alternate DFOs? Explanation

12 the director can appoint additional if

13 necessary. So thank you. We will move on.

14 MS. BUNALES: "Number 16: Caucuses.

15 Groups of committee members may caucus in

16 private to discuss their positions. Positions

17 discussed during caucuses are confidential and

18 may not be disclosed outside the caucus unless

19 authorized by the caucus members. Breaks

20 during committee meetings for caucuses should

21 be held to a minimum. Caucuses are not

22 required to be open to the public."

23 CHAIR ALTOM: Anybody have any comments or

24 concerns? Hearing none.

25 MS. BUNALES: "Number 17: Final Committee
97

1 Report. The committee will prepare a final

2 report containing its recommendations. The

3 recommendations should be based on a consensus

4 of the committee to the extent possible.

5 Committee members should ensure that the

6 organizations they represent agree with the

7 recommendations in the final committee report.

8 If an organization does not agree with any of

9 the recommendations in the final committee

10 report, the organization may submit a minority

11 report stating its position on the matter.

12 Ex-officio members are not required to agree

13 with the recommendations in the final committee

14 report or submit a minority report. The Access

15 Board will consider all recommendations in the

16 final report and any minority reports when

17 developing the proposed rule for the

18 guidelines. "

19 CHAIR ALTOM: Okay. Looks good.

20 MS. BUNALES: Number --

21 CHAIR ALTOM: One second. My apologies.

22 I missed Dennis.

23 MR. CANNON: This is really a linguistic

24 question. It is worded that if an organization

25 does not agree with any of the recommendations,
98

1 it can file a minority report and that implies

2 that they don't agree -- they disagree with the

3 entire report.

4 So it should be something like with one or

5 more recommendations they can file minority

6 reports because an organization may think the

7 whole report is great, except for some small

8 part. You don't want to imply they have to

9 disagree with the report before they can file a

10 minority report.

11 CHAIR ALTOM: Awesome. Did everyone hear

12 that?

13 Just to recap what Dennis was saying, if

14 an organization has just one piece of the

15 report that they don't agree with, they can

16 file a written minority report on that, as

17 opposed to the whole paper.

18 Is everyone in agreement with

19 recommendations and the changing of just slight

20 wording there?

21 MS. BUNALES: You have to repeat it.

22 MR. CAPOZZI: Get rid of the S.

23 CHAIR ALTOM: One or more.

24 MR. CAPOZZI: We will do it during lunch

25 time.
99

1 CHAIR ALTOM: Everyone in agreement with

2 that recommendation to change the word? I'm

3 seeing consensus. Awesome. Thank you.

4 Everyone is in agreement or ready to go to

5 lunch right now.

6 MS. BUNALES: "Number 18: Committee Web

7 page. The Access Board will maintain a web

8 page on the committee's activities. Committee

9 meeting notices, agendas, agenda materials,

10 minutes, draft recommendations and reports, and

11 the final committee report and any minority

12 reports will be posted on the web page. In

13 general, anything submitted to the full

14 committee will be posted. Subcommittee meeting

15 notices and agendas will also be posted, and

16 when directed by the subcommittee chair, agenda

17 materials."

18 CHAIR ALTOM: We all look in agreement.

19 MS. BUNALES: "Number 19: Media

20 announcements. Committee members may not make

21 announcement to or hold discussions with the

22 media unless authorized by the DFO."

23 Number 20, last one: "Discontinue if

24 Unproductive. The Access Board may discontinue

25 committee meetings at any time if the committee
100

1 meetings are unproductive."

2 <<<: I disagree with that. We just keep

3 going.

4 (Chorus of Laughter)

5 MR. HUNTER: Wouldn't be the first time.

6 MR. HART: And just to be clear, you

7 cannot bribe me into it, or technically we are

8 bribeable with lunch.

9 (Chorus of Laughter)

10 CHAIR ALTOM: Awesome. Thank you, very

11 much. And thank you, Rose.

12 MR. CANNON: I have a question. This is

13 related both to the committee web page and the

14 earlier thing about additional materials or I

15 forget what the wording is or things added to

16 the -- materials added to the agenda.

17 Can any member, for example, submit

18 something that he or she wants to have

19 discussed by the committee?

20 MR. BEATTY: You have to give it to me

21 within five days --

22 MR. CANNON: Same process. It is not like

23 it is restricted to only the Chair or anybody

24 who wants --

25 MR. BEATTY: Right. Point out, to some
101

1 degree, it is up to the Chair for the agenda.

2 If you want to make a presentation on something

3 the Chair would decide whether it fits in the

4 agenda.

5 MR. CANNON: I have a short list of things

6 I would like fixed that I would like to show

7 him.

8 MR. CAPOZZI: Short?

9 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, very much. We

10 are almost at the top of the hour, so having

11 been gracious enough to indulge me, went

12 further than I anticipated. As a reward I will

13 give you an extra five minutes for lunch. We

14 will take a recess for lunch and meet back here

15 at 2:00 and we will pick up looking at

16 potential new memberships and time for those

17 folks to give us their presentations. So back

18 at 2:00.

19 (Whereupon, at 12:55 p.m. to 2:12 p.m. the

20 Committee adjourned for the luncheon

21 recess.)

22 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you all for coming

23 back. I know a lot of times when folks go to

24 lunch, it is easy not to come back so I am glad

25 you all did.
102

1 While some of us went to lunch, some of

2 us -- not me, but Paul, sitting beside me, and

3 Rose, went back over the protocols. I will

4 turn it back to Paul.

5 MR. BEATTY: I'm going to point out what

6 we agreed to.

7 Number 17, we added if the organization

8 does not agree with one or more of the

9 recommendations. That was recommended by

10 Dennis Cannon.

11 And go to Number 14, minutes. Every place

12 in the document it says "minutes" we will add

13 the words "summary." Obviously there were

14 typos identifiable like those.

15 In Number 14 we added "within 10 business

16 days" to look at the draft email contained in

17 the summary minutes and reply.

18 And then if we go to Number 4, this is how

19 you add new members. If members got --

20 additional committee members is still the

21 topic. Additional committee members may be

22 added to represent a stakeholder group that is

23 not accurately represented and to achieve

24 balance point of view among committee

25 membership. Upon approval, 3/4 of membership,
103

1 additional members may be recommended to the

2 Access Board Chairperson for membership.

3 Committee members added through the process

4 should begin service upon appointment.

5 Right now the protocol is anybody can

6 join. Of course it is subject to starting

7 point of 3/4 of this committee here. If at

8 some point in the future people are just coming

9 out of the weeds and there is too much time

10 being sucked up by the committee evaluating

11 that, the committee is always free in the

12 future to change the protocol. So if there has

13 to be a further restriction or something added,

14 there can be.

15 We think this addresses your concern. The

16 next meeting someone can petition to join and

17 we would go through the same process the seven

18 individuals are doing today, and recommendation

19 to Access Board Chair and the Chair does the

20 final approval.

21 Is everybody happy with this? At this

22 point I guess I will turn it back to our Chair.

23 And staff would like a voice vote or formal

24 approval that it is in the record, the protocol

25 as amended is the accepted protocol for the
104

1 committee at this point.

2 CHAIR ALTOM: So looking around the room,

3 do we accept these? Do we need a formal motion

4 or accept by consensus? I see heads nodding.

5 Looks good. We will adopt the two consensus.

6 Thank you, Paul, Rose, for working through

7 lunch.

8 Next on the agenda are potential new

9 membership. There are seven organizations that

10 each have a few moments to speak to us. I

11 would like each one to come up here and have

12 five minutes or so to talk. I have a list of

13 order, the American Public Transportation

14 Association will kick us off followed by the

15 Hearing Loss Association of America and then

16 New Jersey Transit, New York City Transit,

17 Q'Straint, Siemens and Washington Metropolitan

18 Transit Authority.

19 After they have their opportunities to

20 speak, we have a ballot we will be passing

21 around that you can vote a yea or nay on. We

22 will collect the ballots and tally. We will

23 take a break after we do the voting and come

24 back and give you the results.

25 Dennis, first off.
105

1 MR. CANNON: Since there is only a short

2 time to give a presentation, the issue is

3 really the interest that they are representing.

4 I would like to make sure they address right

5 upfront how their interest is not represented

6 currently on the committee.

7 CHAIR ALTOM: Perfect. I like it. For

8 those who didn't hear that, we would like you

9 to say how your involvement on the committee

10 would add to it and not represented at the

11 moment.

12 MS. BUNALES: Mr. Chairman, I want you to

13 know I do have committee member Uwe Rutenberg

14 on the line and Ed Steinfeld on the line and

15 both lines are not muted and David Knight,

16 Department of Justice. Glenn Millis, WMATA,

17 and Marshall Lucier Q'Straint and Frank

18 Maldari, Long Island Transit.

19 CHAIR ALTOM: Off the bat, start with the

20 American Public Transportation Association.

21 MR. JOSEPH: Good afternoon, ladies and

22 gentlemen and Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the

23 opportunity to be here and to petition the

24 committee for a position on the Access Board.

25 My name is Charles Joseph, senior program
106

1 manager for the American Public Transportation

2 Association.

3 APTA is a nonprofit international

4 association of more than 1,500 public and

5 private member organizations, engaged in the

6 areas of bus, paratransit, light rail,

7 streetcars, commuter rail, subways, waterborne

8 services and intercity and high-speed passenger

9 rail. This includes: transit systems;

10 planning, design, construction and finance

11 firms; product and service providers; academic

12 institutions; transit associations and state

13 departments of transportation. APTA members

14 serve the public interest by providing safe,

15 efficient and economical transit services and

16 products. More than 90 percent of persons using

17 public transportation in the United States and

18 Canada are served by APTA members.

19 APTA's mission is to strengthen and

20 improve public transportation. APTA serves and

21 leads its diverse membership through standards

22 development, safety advocacy, innovation and

23 information sharing.

24 APTA Standards and Recommended Practices

25 have become an important program activity for
107

1 the public transportation industry. APTA,

2 through its policy and planning committees is

3 responsible for developing and promulgating

4 standards and recommended practices and has

5 played a major role in creating active working

6 structures within the organization focused on

7 the development of standards. Hundreds of

8 industry volunteers serving on numerous working

9 committees and have developed hundreds of

10 standards for bus, rail transit and commuter

11 rail operations, maintenance, procurement and

12 Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS). These

13 consensus-based standards are leading to safer

14 and more accessible systems, improved

15 performance and lower costs. The program is

16 continuing to expand into many new areas of

17 critical importance to the industry. APTA is

18 very active as an industry representative with

19 the Rail Safety Advisory Committee, and served

20 on the Access Board's Public Rights-of-Way

21 Access Advisory Committee from 1999 - 2000.

22 Our members believe that the current

23 regulatory process for a 'Finding of Equivalent

24 Facilitation' appears to be showing an uneven

25 application across projects. Revision of the
108

1 regulation is needed to take new technology

2 into account, to provide a clear statement of

3 the ideal level of required accessibility

4 defined by the Access Board and to provide a

5 clear process for addressing appropriate

6 variances. Such clarifications are critical to

7 the future success of low-floor modern

8 streetcar and light-rail vehicle technology.

9 As an example, streetcar vehicle

10 technology has evolved substantially since the

11 adoption of the ADA regulations in 1991. The

12 development of low-floor light rail and

13 streetcar vehicle technology represents a

14 paradigm shift in transit accessibility that

15 has dramatically improved accessibility for

16 individuals with varying disabilities.

17 One of our committees that is very

18 interested in the work of this advisory

19 committee is the Streetcar Subcommittee. They

20 are composed of experts in operation, design

21 and planning of streetcar systems and who have

22 been instrumental in developing streetcar

23 systems around the country, and has published

24 guideline documents, reports and technical

25 papers and are supportive of efforts of this
109

1 Advisory Committee to provide the best possible

2 methods to address ADA needs. APTA offers its

3 expert resources to the Access Board as it

4 considers the critically needed modifications

5 to Subpart D, incorporating improved

6 accessibility offered by low-floor vehicle

7 technology.

8 APTA has already made significant strides

9 to guide the development of streetcar systems

10 that help avoid poor design practices, improve

11 access and streamline system procurement, as

12 demonstrated in the 2013 published document,

13 "Modern Streetcar Vehicle Guideline".

14 APTA encourages the Advisory Committee to

15 partner with subject matter experts of the APTA

16 Streetcar Subcommittee to address the most

17 effective means of updating the ADA

18 accessibility regulations.

19 Representing our members, we believe APTA

20 can provide and play an important role on this

21 committee and look forward to working with you.

22 Thank you.

23 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

24 I think I will make a judgment call here.

25 Anybody have any questions they would like to
110

1 ask of Mr. Joseph? Dennis.

2 MR. CANNON: I have a hearing problem so I

3 don't always catch it. I didn't catch at the

4 beginning, what is your background.

5 MR. JOSEPH: I'm the senior program

6 manager for APTA. Overall the rail programs

7 where we develop standards and recommended

8 practices for the industry.

9 MR. CANNON: So you are a technical

10 person?

11 MR. JOSEPH: Technical and operations

12 person.

13 CHAIR ALTOM: Anything else?

14 Yes, Marilyn?

15 MS. GOLDEN: Could you clarify, again,

16 what your problem is with the equivalent

17 facilitation provision?

18 MR. JOSEPH: I would like to call on Paul

19 Grether who can talk more specifically on that.

20 MS. GOLDEN: It is something that was in

21 his presentation.

22 MR. CANNON: I caught that too and I

23 forgot. The equivalent facilitation that is

24 not mentioned going on is a provision in all of

25 our regulations. Basically it says you can do
111

1 something different than the standard if it

2 provides equivalent facilitation.

3 The Board does not decide equivalent

4 facilitation; Department of Transportation

5 does. And you have a set regulation process by

6 which you have to go through DOT to get that.

7 So we don't -- the Board does not address

8 how you make that decision. That is up to the

9 Department of Transportation.

10 MR. GRETHER: Is it all right? Thank you.

11 My name is Paul Grether, with Southwest Ohio

12 Regional Transit Authority and I'm the

13 chair-elect of the APTA Street Car

14 Subcommittee.

15 The issue at least in the street car world

16 we're having is not necessarily with the

17 feeling of equivalent facilitation. But

18 because of vehicle technology and accessibility

19 technology for street cars evolving so much

20 since the regulations were written,

21 particularly with the advent of low floor

22 vehicle, it is forcing us in the industry to

23 apply the finding of equivalent facilitation

24 process in areas where we are actually -- if we

25 followed the rules as they are written, we are
112

1 actually reducing accessibility. And that is

2 our struggle and that is why we are very, very

3 interested in this effort.

4 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, Mr. Charles

5 Joseph.

6 Next on our list is the Hearing Loss

7 Association of America. And up next will be

8 New Jersey Transit.

9 MS. HAMLIN: Good afternoon. Thank you

10 for hearing me this afternoon. I'm going to

11 talk to -- my name is Lise Hamlin. I'm the

12 director of public policy at Hearing Loss

13 Association of America and I'm going to address

14 both questions.

15 First a little bit about the organization

16 and then why I would like you to have me here

17 and our organization represented.

18 Hearing Loss Association of America is a

19 national membership organization, which is

20 supported by an office in Bethesda, Maryland,

21 14 state organizations and chapters around the

22 country.

23 We have been operational for 35 years now

24 and we provide assistance and resources for

25 people with hearing loss and their families,
113

1 professionals to learn how to adjust to hearing

2 loss.

3 HLAA is working to raise public awareness

4 for the need for treatment and regular

5 screening throughout life.

6 We have had an impact on communication

7 access, public policy research, public

8 awareness and service delivery related to

9 hearing loss. HLAA works with other consumer

10 organizations and consortium and groups and

11 with policymakers to ensure greater

12 communication access at the national, state and

13 local level.

14 We provide timely and reliable information

15 about hearing loss through our website, our

16 magazine, online news and hearing loss support

17 specialists program, message boards, chat rooms

18 and so forth.

19 Basically we have a lot of interaction

20 between our constituents. We have an outreach

21 of 30,000 people that we can reach and who

22 often call us and contact us through email.

23 We have worked with transportation with

24 Amtrak. We have worked directly to loop

25 stations. Penn Station in New York and D.C.
114

1 station has some loops in it. We have also

2 worked with them regarding their roll-out or

3 their passenger information display system that

4 features automatic updates of Amtrak network

5 and equivalent on the stream platforms with the

6 integration of life information as well as

7 prerecorded information.

8 We also served on a number of boards.

9 Currently I serve on the Transportation

10 Disability Coalition; the Access Board

11 Passenger Vessel Emergency Alarms on the

12 telecommunications electronic communications

13 also on the Access Board; and on the ADAAG

14 Review Advisory Committee.

15 We also work with other agencies as well

16 as other access boards and on the Federal

17 Communication Committee, on their consumer

18 advisory, and others that deal with the

19 Twenty-First Century Communications and Video

20 Accessibility Act of 2010. We also work with

21 other coalitions. So we are constantly in

22 touch with other folks working on issues

23 related to hearing loss.

24 National Disability Leadership Alliance,

25 National Hearing Alliance and Consumer Action
115

1 Network and consumer organizations for

2 accessible technology as well.

3 So why should I be here? Why should HLAA

4 be represented? I remember one of the

5 important things to understand, we are seeing

6 numbers now like 48 million, which is basically

7 20 percent of the population, have some kind of

8 hearing loss. We feel that no one organization

9 can have the depth of experience to represent

10 48 million people. We reach out to a lot of

11 people. We get calls every day.

12 We know that rail transport is not

13 consumer friendly if you have any kind of

14 hearing loss. We feel we can provide input, we

15 have our experience, we have our background.

16 We have been working with professionals and

17 adults with hearing loss, older adults. It is

18 a different perspective when you see a child

19 with hearing loss approach access than you do

20 with someone who is a senior who has aged into

21 their hearing loss.

22 All of these factors are important. One

23 of the things we can add is outreach. We have

24 constant feedback and information. Not just

25 Lise Hamlin speaking to you. We can reach out
116

1 to our members and reach out directly on a

2 question or we can just tell you what we have

3 been hearing from our members.

4 So basically what I'm offering is our time

5 and experience and willingness to work with you

6 and we would be happy to be here to share that

7 with you.

8 CHAIR ALTOM: Awesome. Thank you.

9 Any comments or questions?

10 MR. CANNON: Most of the issues, as far as

11 I know, involve communication of passenger

12 information, "next stop" and "buy your -- cash

13 in your Amtrak card and get a new Visa." If in

14 solving that problem or addressing that, if we

15 were to ensure that those systems were

16 available to people who were totally deaf,

17 would that meet the concerns of your members

18 and if not, why not?

19 MS. HAMLIN: It would. Having visual

20 display systems is usually important and very

21 helpful, but often those systems can only take

22 canned messages.

23 Actually the ones we saw in Amtrak, you

24 can change, but now you have to have somebody

25 who is capable of doing it.
117

1 And the other thing that happens is when

2 we are talking about emergencies, for example,

3 or even what happened -- I don't know how many

4 people took Metro this morning. That didn't

5 work out very well. I had no idea what was

6 going on. I knew they were announcing every

7 single stop what was happening, but because of

8 my hearing loss I couldn't capture it.

9 Now, if there was a system -- this is the

10 kind of thing we would look into is whether it

11 would be feasible to put in, for example, a

12 loop system, where I can turn on my telecoil

13 and be directly connected to it. Would it be

14 feasible to also have a board to also signal to

15 my Smart Phone and I could get that kind of

16 signal or I could hear what was going on

17 through my Smart Phone?

18 There are huge new technologies that are

19 available that, yes, would benefit the segment

20 of population with hearing loss in a different

21 way than it would benefit people who are deaf.

22 Although again the visual systems are really

23 important and absolutely would be something

24 that I would want as well. But that is why it

25 is a slightly different perspective. We could
118

1 bring that to the table and the Board could say

2 yea or nay on it. But it could be something we

3 could bring to the table.

4 CHAIR ALTOM: Awesome. Thank you.

5 Marilyn, did you have --

6 MS. GOLDEN: Yeah, I just had a question,

7 not necessarily for Lise.

8 Like HLAA like (inaudible) are both great

9 organizations and represent people who

10 interests sometimes diverge a little bit. Some

11 of the things work for both but some don't.

12 I had a question about the process.

13 Because seven is a lot. Are we discussing each

14 nomination? Will there be any opportunity for

15 that? Because, if so, it will be hard to go

16 through and go back and remember what the

17 issues were with the first person. To me if we

18 discuss each one -- I guess my comment or

19 question is discussion. I didn't do that

20 with -- for example, there was -- I asked a

21 question, APTA -- I had a response and it

22 didn't make sense to me.

23 <<<: You make a decision among us?

24 MS. GOLDEN: Yes. Even of the responder.

25 I don't know if we are going to go back. If we
119

1 have a discussion, should it be after each

2 conversation?

3 CHAIR ALTOM: What is the group's choice?

4 We can continue with what we have now, which is

5 discuss, each one talks, we ask them questions.

6 What do you guys think?

7 Jim.

8 MR. WEISMAN: I'm going to disagree with

9 Marilyn slightly. I think we should have

10 everybody speak and then have the group discuss

11 the nomination -- the applicants and the

12 balance.

13 MS. GOLDEN: That's fine.

14 CHAIR ALTOM: At the moment the goal is

15 each person speaks, we ask questions, they

16 respond. We have ballots we can pass out to

17 all of us. We can have one more big

18 discussion, if you want, before the ballots

19 come out. Perfect. That is how we will roll.

20 MS. LINTZ: I just wanted to respond to

21 what Dennis said. The whole reason why you

22 need the induction loops, which Lise had

23 mentioned, if the sound is important for

24 passengers then it should be important for all

25 passengers. That is why visual alerts alone
120

1 would not be. Because if that is sufficient

2 for everybody, we should just shut this down.

3 We will get to this further. I just didn't

4 want to leave that hanging like that.

5 CHAIR ALTOM: Any other questions for

6 Janice -- I mean, for Lise?

7 Thank you.

8 Next we have New Jersey Transit and on

9 deck will be New York City Transit.

10 MR. HOFF: I'm Ed Hoff from New Jersey

11 Transit. I'm the director of ADA compliance at

12 New Jersey Transit. And Paul asked me to

13 remind the group that New Jersey Transit did

14 submit an application on time; however, the

15 Board did not have the opportunity to review

16 that. Paul is saying he messed up. I'm not

17 going to say that. But thank you, Paul, and

18 thank you for actually including it on the

19 agenda as well. I appreciate that.

20 New Jersey Transit covers an area of about

21 5,300 square miles. It's the nation's third

22 largest provider of public transportation in

23 the country. The largest provider of public

24 transportation statewide and in the country.

25 It operates of course in New Jersey and New
121

1 York but reaches in Philadelphia. The agency

2 operates a fleet of 2,027 buses, 711 trains and

3 45 light rail vehicles. On 236 bus routes and

4 11 rail lines statewide, NJ Transit provides

5 New Jersey nearly 223 million passenger trips

6 every year.

7 Of course I didn't mention our IDA

8 paratransit system I'm proud of as well. It is

9 also obviously has a statewide reach and

10 provides at least a million rides a year. It

11 is called Access Link.

12 I'm in my 19th year at New Jersey Transit

13 and although my responsibilities have changed

14 over the years, I have always provided the

15 corporation with sound judgment and advice in

16 providing accessible transportation. I

17 provided invaluable input, specifically for the

18 purposes of today's meeting, in design of light

19 rail vehicles that operate, and we have two

20 different types that operate on the systems.

21 One is diesel powered vehicle that

22 operates on the river line between Camden and

23 Trenton. The other one is the -- that was

24 manufactured by I-Trans (ph). The other

25 vehicle operates on our Hutsinberg (ph) and
122

1 light rail system and a newer light rail system

2 made with a consortium by a company called

3 Chikanshrio (ph).

4 And I provide input on multi rail cars

5 where I consulted or provided input up in St.

6 Bruno, Quebec.

7 New Jersey Transit sits at the forefront

8 as far as transit providers go, public transit

9 providers go in not only meeting the

10 regulations and providing accessible

11 transportation but going beyond that.

12 Also in the last five or 10 years I have

13 been involved with researchers from the

14 University of Pittsburgh and RESNA in looking

15 at ways we can integrate our bridge plate

16 system, our gap bridging mechanism into our

17 existing commuter rail cars making those

18 systems simpler. That is just one portion of

19 the things that we look to do at New Jersey

20 Transit that certainly goes beyond. And

21 hopefully these regulations will address some

22 of those things we are looking to do in making

23 all our systems more accessible to people with

24 disabilities.

25 CHAIR ALTOM: Awesome. Thank you.
123

1 Questions or comments for Ed?

2 MR. CANNON: I should have asked this of

3 the others but I forgot. If New Jersey Transit

4 were selected or recommended, who would be the

5 representative? Would that be you?

6 MR. HOFF: That would be me?

7 MR. HART: Knowing that we have a

8 colleague from New York here as well, is there

9 anything that New Jersey or New York that is

10 different that you bring? Say, New York or

11 Metra or -- Dennis raised this before. It

12 would be helpful for the whole committee to be

13 very clear on this.

14 MR. HOFF: I'm not sure. This question I

15 was -- I was thinking of this question when I

16 think Dennis or somebody else mentioned it for

17 the seven of us to understand where the holes

18 are in the stakeholders and try to fill those

19 holes.

20 Truthfully I don't know the stakeholders

21 that well to know where those holes are. I

22 don't know how to answer the question. I know

23 about New Jersey Transit and I know New Jersey

24 Transit quite a bit about its accessibility

25 across everything that we provide, between
124

1 facility, training, operations, the whole

2 gamut.

3 What I don't know is I don't know that New

4 York City Transit as well. Certainly enough to

5 speak to that. So I don't really know how we

6 are different.

7 MR. CARLSON: However, there are huge

8 differences between people from New York and

9 people from New Jersey, I want to establish

10 that.

11 (Chorus of Laughter)

12 MR. HOFF: When I order a cup of coffee

13 here, people think I from New York.

14 MR. HART: And we are not going to talk

15 about baseball.

16 (Chorus of Laughter)

17 MR. SLAUGHTER: I would just like to say,

18 it is good to have our neighbors from -- and

19 co-users of track from New Jersey here. I

20 think it is important in looking at

21 organizations like Jersey Transit and the New

22 York authorities and APTA as well as the other

23 authorities represented here.

24 What will happen, and I'm looking at the

25 folks from the other railroads, these are the
125

1 folks that we are going to be dealing with at

2 APTA, which is the industry representatives.

3 And what comes out of APTA on the heavy rail

4 side where we have experienced it has been

5 really, really good and it gives organizations,

6 like Amtrak and New Jersey Transit and the

7 other railroads and the industry manufacturers

8 and things, an opportunity to come together and

9 take what comes out of the regulatory side and

10 put it into a shared condition that we can all

11 share within the industry and have opportunity

12 to put something back out to the traveling

13 public that is coherent and better. So that is

14 my two cents worth.

15 CHAIR ALTOM: Excellent. Thank you. Any

16 other?

17 MR. KOLIG: New Jersey Transit and New

18 York MTA bring a much larger system and

19 handling much larger number of people and

20 throughput is larger. Their ability to handle

21 the regulations that we would put into effect

22 here as a higher volume capacity would be very

23 valuable to have.

24 CHAIR ALTOM: Next we have New York City

25 Transit and next we will have Q'Straint so.
126

1 MR. WETHERELL: My name is Mike Wetherell

2 at New York City Transit and I'm here to

3 petition on behalf of the New York MTA. First

4 off we have a presentation upon the screen.

5 There are no photos to describe.

6 First off, who are we? The MTA is

7 comprised of six operating agencies and

8 operates subway, base and commuter rail

9 services as well as seven vehicular bridges and

10 two tunnels. The MTA is the largest transit

11 agency in the country. MTA serves a population

12 of 15.1 million people in a 5,000 square mile

13 area, including New York City, Long Island,

14 Southeastern New York State and Connecticut.

15 MTA subways buses and railroads provide

16 2.62 billion trips each year. We carry one in

17 three of the nation's mass transit users and

18 2/3 of the nation's rail riders. MTA rail

19 network covers over 2,000 track miles with over

20 730 rail and subway stations and almost 9,000

21 subway and rail cars.

22 The operating budget for 2013 is

23 13.2 billion-dollars.

24 First off our subway system. New York

25 City Transit operates over 21 interconnected
127

1 subway routes -- excuse me. That is the next

2 slide, please. New York City operates over 28

3 interconnected subway rights, provides

4 4.5 million passenger trips per day, ranking

5 seventh in the world subway systems. New York

6 City Transit provides accessible stations and

7 crossover platforms in all five boroughs of New

8 York City for a total of 468 subway systems.

9 If you add 10 more station we equal the rest of

10 the countries total number of subway systems.

11 The New York City Transit currently

12 operates 6,282 subway cars. Since the year

13 2000, New York City Transit has purchased 3,494

14 new subway cars with present orders of 426 new

15 and 380 converted communications based train

16 control cars. We will purchase up to 1,000 new

17 rail cars in the next five year capital

18 program.

19 Turning to our commuter rail systems --

20 and my alternate, Frank Maldari, is a member of

21 the Long Island Railroad Engineering

22 Department.

23 Long Island Railroad and Metro North with

24 the two largest and busiest commuter railroads

25 in the United States. Combined ridership of
128

1 220 million passengers. Since 1990 Metro North

2 and Long Island Railroad has purchased 1,670

3 passenger vehicles and 479 cars presently in

4 production. The TW railroads have plans to

5 purchase up to 500 rail cars in the next

6 capital program.

7 So why include us? The extent of rail car

8 procurement activity at New York MTA is

9 unparalleled in United States. We are a major

10 stakeholders. MTA resources can assist in the

11 Board's understanding of past and present

12 practice in rail car accessibility. If you

13 look at New York Transit alone based on a

14 40-year vehicle life we need to order 200 cars

15 per year forever.

16 MTA can provide feasibility information

17 for retrofit and new car designs. We cover the

18 gambit. We have cars built 40 years ago,

19 almost 50 years ago up to cars that are

20 presently in production.

21 MTA will likely be the largest application

22 of Access Board initiatives in the future.

23 Thank you for your consideration.

24 CHAIR ALTOM: Questions or comments?

25 MR. CANNON: If MTA were selected would
129

1 you be the representative?

2 MR. WETHERELL: Yes, I would.

3 MR. CANNON: And can I ask your

4 background?

5 MR. WETHERELL: Yes, and thank you. I'm a

6 mechanical engineer by trade. I have 26 years

7 in the rail industry. I have worked for a

8 major rail car manufacturer. I worked for

9 component suppliers. I have also been

10 assistant chief mechanical officer in a

11 commuter railroad, Long Island Railroad, and

12 I'm presently the chief mechanical officer.

13 So my responsibility is that 6,283 cars

14 and 14 shops, two overhaul shops and our

15 department is about 4,000 people.

16 As I said, we feel that we can contribute.

17 We have a large engineering department. We can

18 do feasibility studies. We do rail car

19 purchases all the time and I want to make my

20 staff and myself available.

21 I also served on the APTA Passenger Rail

22 Equipment and Safety Task Force as chairman.

23 CHAIR ALTOM: Awesome. Thank you. Any

24 other questions? Down at the end.

25 MR. PHILLIPS: I was curious, what has
130

1 your agency done to make the rail cars more

2 accessible to people with disabilities

3 historically?

4 MR. WETHERELL: Well, I mean, one of the

5 things that -- well, we have done several

6 things. We have a very old system. We have

7 modified several stations to make sure we meet

8 ADA accessibility as far as the rail car

9 accessibility.

10 As far as rail car design, we absolutely

11 comply. We have put in what we think are the

12 most modern communications systems available.

13 We also, as far as door warning and the -- I

14 mean, as far as accessibility requirements we

15 have met them, but we are also looking at other

16 things.

17 Obviously we have had fold-up seats, we

18 have had wheelchair spaces. We also are

19 looking at right now for our next rail car

20 order the possibility of having open gangway or

21 articulations where there is free passage

22 through rail cars without obstruction.

23 We have a two-year program going on right

24 now to look at what the needs are of the

25 passengers, all passengers and to develop the
131

1 next generation of cars that will be with us

2 for the next 40 years. Not only are we looking

3 on the cars we are presently building to

4 comply, but we are looking for opportunities in

5 our coming rail car orders to be even greater

6 accessibility.

7 CHAIR ALTOM: Terry, do you still have a

8 question?

9 MS. PACHECO: I had basically the same

10 question.

11 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

12 <<<: I feel I'm the person responding

13 sometimes to the questions as well. But New

14 York City Transit has done some positive things

15 and MTA and I wish we could do better. And the

16 positive part they have put in visual alerts to

17 station stops on -- I would say all of the new

18 cars for the rail and they have added induction

19 loops to their call boxes and subway

20 information booths.

21 Their buses, they are adding visual alerts

22 on their new buses, their new bus system, but

23 they are not adding induction loops. We are

24 hoping to change that. So those are some of

25 the things -- and for wheelchair access, there
132

1 have been improvements inside the subway cars

2 to let people know which subway cars have

3 wheelchair access and which don't so people can

4 preplan. On the negative side not all stations

5 have wheelchair access, which is problematic.

6 Is that a fair --

7 MR. WETHERELL: That is correct. We have

8 key stations and a lot of it has to do with the

9 age of our system. We are making modifications

10 and upgrading and all of our new stations where

11 we are actually expanding our system. Second

12 Avenue subway will be accessible. This is

13 something we do deal with on a day-to-day

14 basis.

15 We have an old system and we have cars

16 running on a system that was designed for

17 60-foot cars. We have 75-foot cars. We

18 struggle but we comply. Basically it is making

19 an old system comply with the new regulations

20 as best we can. And on our new equipment,

21 making sure we comply 100 percent and look for

22 opportunities to do additional things.

23 Do you have a follow up, Janice?

24 MS. LINTZ: I wanted to add I, from the

25 hearing loss community, think it would be
133

1 invaluable to add the New York Transit MTA.

2 Because, realistically, I think if we are going

3 to move forward in getting these things done,

4 the transit is going to be the leader around

5 the country because of the number. And I think

6 we need to get buy-in from them to get this

7 done and realistic information about what can

8 be done.

9 And I have worked so with Michael --

10 Thomas Prendergast, who is head of the MTA

11 directly and three predecessors. I think it is

12 a very proactive feeling at the MTA and I think

13 it would be helpful to us to move this forward

14 in a productive way of getting the information

15 and accurate information and convincing the MTA

16 of why they need to do more in terms of

17 wheelchair access and induction loops within

18 rail cars.

19 CHAIR ALTOM: Jim.

20 MR. WEISMAN: I believe they should be on

21 the committee. I have been fighting with MTA

22 since I got my law degree. It is really true.

23 On behalf of disabled people, we only have 88

24 stations out of 468 accessible now. We will

25 have a little more than 100 by 2020. But this
134

1 is the industry leader. And they buy the most

2 equipment and they -- Cliff Perez and I were

3 talking right before lunch about something

4 Lyndon Johnson once said.

5 MR. PEREZ: You are going to bring that

6 up?

7 MR. WEISMAN: I have to. "Better to have

8 them in the tent pissing out than outside the

9 tent pissing in." Between New Jersey Transit

10 and MTA, you are moving most of the people who

11 ride every day in the country and we want their

12 buy-in. We want them on the committee. We

13 want them saying, "This is a good idea, not a

14 bad idea."

15 Sorry, Marsha. He was the president of

16 the United States I was quoting, by the way.

17 (Chorus of Laughter)

18 MR. WEISMAN: But if you get buy-in on

19 transit on this, the industry will make what we

20 need and do what we want and we will not be

21 fighting with transit. They will be our ally

22 and we will be moving it together.

23 To show you where MTA is coming from, 40

24 years after they fought us on accessible

25 transit, they are now figuring out they should
135

1 not have been cheap on accessible stations

2 because paratransit is killing them. Five

3 hundred million a year and we are working with

4 the law department to come up with a plan to

5 apply for the 20 percent rule -- if you don't

6 know. If you renovate a non-key station you

7 have to spend 20 percent on accessibility. But

8 20 percent doesn't buy elevators because they

9 are so expensive. We are trying to create a

10 fund we can pick extra stations.

11 In New York City they go in borough by

12 train and stay in their borough. It creates a

13 huge burden in paratransit system to go into

14 boroughs. MTA, the next generation of

15 leadership is dealing with the problem that

16 their predecessors created for them and they

17 are trying to be creative in coming up with

18 ways to do this. All this involves federal

19 regulations which are generally, they have to

20 be generally applicable to the United States

21 but it is very difficult to make a perfect fit

22 when you are moving, how many, 8 million people

23 a day.

24 <<<: Eight million between the buses and

25 the subway. The subway is 5.4.
136

1 I think the big operators should probably

2 be on the committee because we need their

3 support.

4 <<<: There are a lot of big operators so

5 I don't know what the cut off is. To me I go

6 back to Dennis' principle. I realize there may

7 be particular reasons particular entities

8 should be on the committee. Although I

9 primarily ask what rep is not represented.

10 I am much less familiar with the specifics

11 of New York because I'm not from the area and I

12 don't work with your system very much.

13 Going from your statement about

14 compliance, I have a two-part question. One

15 part is for all your various kinds of trains,

16 all your various rail stations, are all cars

17 accessible, the first question? In most

18 transit instances we have to say no.

19 The second question is, do you do any

20 remanufacturing of cars and, if so, have you

21 done that in compliance with the ADA rail car

22 remanufacturing requirements, which get ignored

23 a lot?

24 MR. WETHERELL: The MTA is comprised not

25 only subway, we also have commuter. All of our
137

1 cars are designed to be accessible. Is every

2 location at every station 100 percent

3 accessible? I don't know the answer to that

4 question. But I can look into it for you. But

5 all of our cars are designed to interface with

6 the stations to be accessible. All of our

7 newer cars do have warning lights and bells and

8 the communication systems are both audible and

9 also visual.

10 But the older cars, a lot of them, were

11 built in the 70s. So we didn't -- we can't say

12 that all of them are 100 percent, what you

13 would call, accessible. I know on the commuter

14 rail, most of the fleet has gone through a

15 transition.

16 The commuter rail has something we don't

17 and that is they have bathrooms and all the

18 bathrooms are accessible and there are -- you

19 know, the rules as far as a commuter train is a

20 little different than subway car.

21 But, yes, as far as the 100 percent

22 compliance -- I think Frank could probably help

23 me out. I think by the time they replace the

24 M-3s are going to have 100 percent accessible

25 rail cars. Frank, are you on the phone?
138

1 MS. GOLDEN: Do you remanufacturer cars?

2 MR. WETHERELL: We don't. We used to have

3 a program that we send them out to a car

4 builder to overhaul them. We have gone to what

5 we call an SMS program which is we take systems

6 periodically, whether it be on a four-year,

7 five-year, 17-year cycle and we replace the

8 systems in-house. We don't do any structural

9 work to the vehicles.

10 MS. GOLDEN: Replace the systems in-house

11 meaning?

12 MR. WETHERELL: We will take the trucks

13 off, we will put new wheels and axles. We will

14 take the braking system and refurbish them. We

15 will take every system on the car apart and

16 redo it.

17 MS. GOLDEN: So it is a lot of rehabbing

18 to extend the vehicle's life?

19 MR. WETHERELL: That is exactly what it

20 is.

21 MS. GOLDEN: Right. And the ADA

22 requirement is making it accessible -- Dennis

23 will remember --

24 MR. WETHERELL: Excuse me. One of the key

25 things you said is extend the life. The life
139

1 of our cars is 40 years. Having a seven- or

2 four-year cycle on a battery or a brake system

3 or the trucks does not extend the life. What

4 it does is -- we've gone to a reliability-based

5 system where when we do these periodic

6 change-out of components we are looking for

7 reliability. We are looking to take the system

8 and renew it before it breaks down. We are not

9 extending the life.

10 MS. BUNALES: Did you still need

11 Mr. Maldari's line open?

12 <<<: I think that is a rhetorical

13 question. I think I'm right about that.

14 CHAIR ALTOM: Terry and Cliff.

15 MS. PACHECO: Can I just ask. I'm

16 wondering of the equipment and stations that

17 you have made accessible, can you tell us what

18 you have done as far as accessibility for

19 people with vision loss? Not that I have

20 anything against the deaf or wheelchairs but we

21 tend to be an area people don't think a lot

22 about. I'm wondering what you have done as far

23 as accessibility for people with those types of

24 disabilities.

25 MR. WETHERELL: Do you mean compliance?
140

1 MS. PACHECO: I mean, compliance or under

2 best practices. I'm talking things like

3 audible signage, like putting your signage

4 where people can see it, tactical warning

5 strips, those kind of things.

6 <<<: And also between car barriers?

7 MS. PACHECO: Exactly.

8 MR. WETHERELL: Our specification for new

9 cars, we have audible alarms when the doors are

10 going to be shutting. We are between car

11 barriers. We will take a car out of service if

12 even a chain is not hooked up or any kind of

13 barrier problems we have. We have strict

14 compliance rules where we have the car designed

15 to comply with ADA and if we have a system that

16 is not operating, such as a door chime is not

17 working, that train will be taken out of

18 service.

19 So we take our operations seriously

20 because we do move so many people and so many

21 people with special needs that we can't afford

22 not to do that. So we strictly comply with the

23 ADA.

24 MR. PEREZ: My question is very similar to

25 Terry's, but more specific regarding just plain
141

1 sound.

2 I don't know if any of you recall or

3 ridden on the subway but let me give you an

4 idea of how it sounds when you get to the

5 station: (Intentionally inaudible) "Watch out

6 for the closing doors." If you are going to be

7 on the committee, this could help so we can

8 have clarity what freaking station I'm at or

9 going to, I would be voting for you. I don't

10 know you can respond to the fact after all the

11 years that is the only thing you can understand

12 when you ride the subway.

13 MR. WETHERELL: Point well taken. If you

14 ride any of the 3400 cars that we have bought

15 in the last 12 years you will see that we have

16 an automatic announcement system that not only

17 does it tell you what the next station is, it

18 gives the announcements and matches the audio

19 with the visual. Some of the older systems,

20 you get somebody who puts their face too close

21 to a microphone or doesn't talk properly into

22 it, you can have issues.

23 What we have been doing for the last --

24 more than half the fleet we automated that.

25 And we have done regular updates to the ADS
142

1 system.

2 Major part of my day-to-day

3 responsibilities to make sure the systems are

4 accurate and any changes to any lines are

5 updated. Those systems will tell you where you

6 are going, where the line goes to, it will tell

7 you what the next station is and it will also

8 tell you what time it is and goes into "see

9 something/say something."

10 We have done a tremendous amount of

11 improvement to the very problem that you were

12 talking about.

13 But we have also on the older lines worked

14 with our conductors to ensure that they are

15 trained as to how to properly talk into those

16 microphones.

17 Again, you may run into a situation where

18 you have problems with audibility. Most of the

19 time it is not a equipment related problem.

20 MR. HUNTER: Mr. Chairman, I want to ask a

21 comment about a lot of what is said. I think

22 the presence of New York MTA at the table and

23 the fact they are willingly coming to this

24 group and asking to be part of this group and

25 that has generated quite a bit of question and
143

1 answer, quite a bit of communication, a lot of

2 comments, I think it is a testament to how

3 important -- how it is major players in the

4 transit industry, such as New York City

5 Transit, the New York City MTA, the New York

6 City Transit and APTA will play in the success

7 of this program.

8 If this program really wants to have a

9 profound impact on transit accessibility and

10 improvements in transit accessibility in this

11 country in the near future, it is going to be

12 critical that those parties are here at the

13 table, willingly having dialogue, agreeing to

14 the terms of the proposed regulatory language

15 because they are the ones who will be

16 responsible for implementing it both through

17 capital projects like retrofits and

18 modifications.

19 Marilyn brought up the question of

20 modifications. A lot of what the industry has

21 been struggling with and a lot of what this

22 committee is being brought forward to discuss

23 is a lot of weakness in current ADA. I

24 understand a lot of that can be made easier for

25 the transit agencies to accomplish.
144

1 We all want to accomplish the same thing,

2 but there are ways it can be done in a much

3 more efficient manner and I really think that

4 we have before us an opportunity to bring some

5 people into this group right now who will

6 really have a very profound, positive impact on

7 the success of this group. And I think that

8 that is something that we should all be aware

9 of. Thank you.

10 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

11 We have talked about this for quite a bit.

12 You have been on the hot seat a lot. Is there

13 any question outside of what we have already

14 talked about you would like to ask? Janice?

15 We will try to get through this quickly.

16 MS. LINTZ: I just wanted to respond to

17 Terry. I don't mean to speak for the MTA but

18 because I worked for the MTA there is a part

19 that I -- I feel like I'm representing them.

20 There are visual alert strips on the

21 platform for people with visual impairments and

22 I believe where you buy your Metro card it has

23 also been a tactile -- it is raised tactile so

24 you can figure out what to purchase.

25 Also the only other thing I wanted to say,
145

1 because I feel like having now spoken so much

2 that my silence will be perceived about --

3 Hearing Loss Association admission will be

4 perceived as I'm not welcoming them. I don't

5 want my silence to be perceived that way,

6 especially if additional industry being added,

7 having another voice at the table representing

8 people with hearing loss should be welcomed. I

9 didn't want my silence to be like I was going

10 to push them away.

11 CHAIR ALTOM: Quickly.

12 MR. HART: I want to clarify. When we are

13 speaking about service life, typically a car

14 has a service life of 25 to 38 years and in

15 some cases a transit agency had to prolong or

16 extend the life of those cars. And that may

17 involve mechanical work, it may involve

18 structural work because of rust.

19 So 40-year-old cars -- regulation put in

20 place 25 years ago.

21 I wanted to just note while I appreciate

22 my colleagues from New Jersey and New York

23 talking about progress -- a couple of my

24 colleagues highlight -- Boston is the fifth

25 largest transit agency and we will be providing
146

1 250 new cars in the next four years. We are

2 the oldest transit agency.

3 And Boston, unlike our brothers south, has

4 actually done some -- has 78 of our 84 subway

5 overhead stations are accessible. And I

6 highlight that because I don't want to get the

7 misconception that there is not a lot of work

8 to be done in older systems. Boston was lucky;

9 it had proactive managers.

10 As Jim Weisman correctly highlighted, the

11 real issue for older systems and how they

12 achieve access is not strictly about cars.

13 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

14 Marilyn, quickly, quickly, quickly.

15 MS. GOLDEN: I was going to say, I didn't

16 realize the full scale of the problem but we

17 have it in living color sort of amongst us,

18 which is a car gets extensively rehabbed but if

19 it is not defined --

20 It flashes green and then red. I think it

21 needs a battery, maybe. Is there another mic?

22 If transit agencies are doing a lot of

23 work on old cars but they don't exactly define

24 it as extending the vehicle's life, it will

25 last just as long, then the rehab is not
147

1 required to make it accessible. The ADA intent

2 is clear. When you are doing a lot of work on

3 a vehicle, it has to be made accessible. If

4 feasible, and feasibility is defined very

5 broadly.

6 So I don't know. It is disheartening to

7 hear that people are using a semantic argument

8 that gets around the letters of the ADA. And

9 that is one of many reasons I have to

10 disagree -- is it Stanton, the gentleman from

11 CalTrans?

12 MR. HUNTER: Stan Hunter.

13 MS. GOLDEN: I appreciate that you feel

14 this way. I wish I did. But I don't think I

15 feel that we all want the same thing, actually.

16 I wasn't going to start talking about it but

17 since you said that.

18 It could be conceivable that some of the

19 changes some people want in the ADA regulation

20 could actually result in more access. I guess

21 it is possible. Most of us who are ADA

22 advocates for most of our professional life,

23 you know, the first thing we are going to hear

24 when you want federal law change is that it is

25 going to be weaker so money won't have to be
148

1 spent. I don't think we can say we all want

2 the same thing. If that were true, I don't

3 think we would need the committee.

4 I'm eager to work together. I don't want

5 to alienate everybody, which I've probably

6 already done. But those of us who are

7 advocates have spent a lot of time trying to

8 make accessibility happen, often to no avail.

9 I will be happy to sing Kumbaya when we all

10 agree. If you want full access for people with

11 disabilities, then we all want the same thing.

12 MR. HOFF: I need to answer because, first

13 of all, I invite you to come to New York and

14 get an understanding of what we are talking

15 about when we are talking about maintenance.

16 As far as extending the life of a car, we

17 in our specification, require a car builder to

18 build a stainless steel car that will last for

19 40 years. It is a requirement, design issue.

20 As far as accessibility, accessibility for our

21 cars match up with the station's platforms.

22 And as far as wheelchair accessibility, we have

23 that.

24 If you are talking about modernizing

25 communications systems on 3,000 cars, it would
149

1 have to be a program where you have to take the

2 cars out of service. I think you have the

3 misconception that we take the cars out of

4 service and do major work. We take them out of

5 service every few weeks, every seven to 14

6 years to take the trucks off, renew the axle,

7 take the systems off and put refurbished

8 systems back on. It is not major work. I

9 think it is very difficult in this room to

10 describe that.

11 If you like, we can have you in New York

12 and I will take you into our overhaul shops and

13 I will show you exactly what we are doing and

14 we can get a better understanding.

15 I think that would also help the members

16 of the community to understand exactly what

17 work is being done on the cars and where we do

18 have opportunities. I think there is one thing

19 we can contribute, that we can bring that

20 understanding.

21 MS. GOLDEN: Thank you.

22 CHAIR ALTOM: We have to get back on

23 track. That may be an issue that we put on our

24 issues topic we talk about later. Thank you,

25 Michael. I really appreciate it.
150

1 We have Q'Straint on the phone.

2 MR. LUCIER: Thank you. Can everyone hear

3 me okay? I would like to thank you guys for

4 the opportunity and consideration for Q'Straint

5 inclusion to the Rail Vehicles Access Advisory

6 Membership. I think we bring a unique voice

7 for the wheelchair passenger once on the

8 vehicle.

9 People talk about accessibility and that

10 is all well and good to get the rider on the

11 vehicle. Then what? Q'Straint is the

12 worldwide leader on wheelchair security. We

13 have been on the forefront of the wheelchair

14 scene and testing for more than 30 years.

15 Somebody referenced working with the

16 University of Pittsburgh. We do a lot of

17 studies and work with them directly. During

18 that time we worked closely with the ADA

19 community to assist in compliance and

20 innovations. Locally owned and operated we

21 work nationally to more than 60 countries. And

22 we hope to bring our expertise to the Board.

23 There is a component that is missing on

24 U.S. Access Board for rail. Where

25 accessibility and rail is an accomplished
151

1 milestone need to discuss wheelchair safety

2 during transportation. Quietly Q'Straint

3 should be included. More accessible doesn't

4 necessarily mean safe transportation. And I

5 think that is something we can bring to the

6 committee as far as our innovative design, our

7 unique perspectives on securing wheelchairs

8 while they are in motion. We are in transit

9 and paratransit vehicles throughout the country

10 and rail is the new frontier for us to help

11 with this as more and more people are riding

12 the rail system.

13 I feel it is something we can learn as a

14 part of this committee to figure out what

15 demands are out there, what potential we could

16 be doing to assist in helping for a safer

17 wheelchair ride or transportation. Thank you

18 for your consideration. I know Dennis is going

19 the ask a question.

20 CHAIR ALTOM: I was going to say you Knew

21 it was coming.

22 MR. LUCIER: I worked very closely with

23 OEM developing and engineering our product into

24 their vehicles. I also was -- my alternate

25 members who would also be -- he is truly a
152

1 engineer. I am only an engineer because I play

2 one on TV. I work very closely with the

3 engineering teams and mostly the designers and

4 OEMs. I work closely with our engineering

5 team. We are a very small company, very

6 tightknit company. Being the owner of the

7 company, I'm involved with research and

8 development on a regular basis.

9 We been -- like I said, the company itself

10 has been working with wheelchair securements

11 nationally and internationally for the last 30

12 years.

13 MR. CANNON: It is not exactly a statement

14 but more of a statement. Many years ago

15 including when we first started with Rehab Act

16 requirements it was determined a lot of

17 research by CalTrans and FRA due to the

18 G-forces because a train does not stop like a

19 bus, that securement is not required on any

20 rail system.

21 Aside from that particular issue, there is

22 a practical one, which is it is different to

23 say when you have a bus driver on a bus and you

24 are in the bus, that there is somebody

25 available that can fasten the securement versus
153

1 a conductor on a train who may or may not be in

2 your vicinity to either lock you in or unlock

3 you at the time you need to get off or move

4 around or go to the restroom or anything else.

5 From a practical standpoint and G-force

6 standpoint it is always a consideration that

7 wheelchair constraints are not required in any

8 rail system.

9 MR. GIRARDEN: I can understand that and I

10 agree wholeheartedly. It is a very difficult

11 and arduous task to accommodate that. But the

12 G-forces do cause wheelchairs to move, tip over

13 and therefore not meeting the ADA law, which is

14 it is not supposed to move in any direction two

15 inches. In reality you have a way where you

16 have wheelchair riders who are on a vehicle

17 that may not necessary tip over but that chair

18 sliding into a (inaudible) can cause

19 (inaudible) on to another rider.

20 I think it is something that may have to

21 be reconsidered. Simultaneously we are

22 developing products that do not require driver

23 or conductor interaction and that is something

24 I want to make the Board aware of. And that is

25 some of the products we would be willing to
154

1 bring to the committee to talk about.

2 CHAIR ALTOM: Blair, you have your hand

3 up.

4 MR. SLAUGHTER: Since the inception of the

5 ADA in 1990 there have been changes in the

6 federal requirement and recommendations from

7 the NTSB as far as securing various things and

8 even prior to 1990 how we manage things that

9 are brought into the train by passengers,

10 whether it be baggage or whatever, or things we

11 bring in, appliances or things that have to be

12 restrained.

13 It has been a concern, I know, for folks

14 at Amtrak, especially not so much in normal

15 train motion because of the accelerations and

16 decelerations and normal train motion and

17 almost not seen by wheelchairs, but in more

18 severe incidents it poses a threat to the

19 person in the wheelchair and others around

20 them.

21 And I fought for many years to the

22 gentleman's point from Q'Straint, that a smart

23 way forward would be a system that was

24 universal that allowed the person in the

25 wheelchair to have their full independence and
155

1 yet the security and safety of being restrained

2 like anyone else or anything else in the

3 vehicle.

4 So that is a point I would like to make

5 and I think that there were some efforts early

6 on when the ADA was being crafted that was put

7 back by, I believe, one of the wheelchair

8 companies that is no longer around because they

9 just didn't want to deal with it.

10 I think there is some room to look at

11 those things, especially as we go forward for

12 the overall safety of everyone in the train.

13 CHAIR ALTOM: Any other? Chris?

14 MR. HART: Just for a technical

15 standpoint, with high speed rail, no one is

16 doing chair security in high speed rail.

17 That said, for cars that are -- street

18 cars, particularly PCC, had head-on collision,

19 street cars, there is possibly a G-force case

20 to be made.

21 But I just want the committee to be aware

22 of it. In high speed rail in Europe and in

23 Japan, nobody is doing securement.

24 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you, Chris.

25 <<<: I might add to the previous speakers
156

1 our research has shown that there has been

2 increasing tendency also of people using

3 scooters who come on board public

4 transportation vehicles, that also includes

5 trains, many of these persons who are using the

6 scooter actually requested on their own will

7 change or transfer to a regular seat, in case

8 the scooter still has to be secured in a way

9 that is safe for other passengers in these

10 environments.

11 So there might be an area for securement

12 systems to apply to this as well on trains.

13 Thank you.

14 CHAIR ALTOM: Not seeing any other hands,

15 thank you, very much, folks at Q'Straint.

16 Next on the agenda is Siemens followed by

17 the Washington Metropolitan Transit Authority.

18 MR. SINGH: Good afternoon. I'm here to

19 represent Siemens Transportation System in

20 Sacramento. We are the leaders in North

21 America. And I have been a systems engineer

22 since 2005. And I have provided automatic

23 ramps for City of Calgary, Denver has many

24 ramps, Oakland has automatic ramps. Salt Lake

25 City has automatic ramps, and San Diego has
157

1 automatic ramps and bridge plates.

2 And I'm in a unique position. I take the

3 request for proposal last year from big

4 authorities, small authorities which are citing

5 the committees are CFRs regulation to be

6 complying with the ramps and I make sure

7 working with the OEMs, our OEMs whenever you

8 get a compliant ramp.

9 The only exception that we have was on the

10 two-inch barriers on the ramp that we applied

11 for Portland. I assisted them, Salt Lake City,

12 assisted them; San Diego, I assisted them.

13 Based on these assistance for Portland 5,

14 my ramp is as wide as the door opening. If the

15 door opens 1220-millimeters my ramp is

16 1220-meters wide.

17 My challenge is I get goose bumps when I

18 talk about when I went to an ADA outreach down

19 in San Diego. I met many different people.

20 There is a whole range of moment challenging

21 events in the ADA community. There was one guy

22 he looked normal, but he was an amputee from

23 some war. I didn't ask him what war. But

24 total amputee. He had two prosthetic legs.

25 Young kid, 21 years old. Only thing he could
158

1 do is move his face. He was the fastest kid on

2 the block. I was uniquely qualified to assist

3 the committee when we get the proposals and how

4 to deal with it in a technical compliant manner

5 and also cost effective, which is very

6 important to us.

7 If we propose a car that is

8 10 million-dollars, no one would buy it.

9 Cities can't afford it. So we have to come

10 with a design that are ADA compliant and also

11 very cost effective. We have done that. I

12 have personally spent almost a year in Europe

13 with two different OEMs designing these ramps

14 with them.

15 And, secondly, my change point when I was

16 doing the outreach program I was partly in the

17 outreach in San Diego.

18 And the third thing I was talking to

19 Janice here, I believe, about the visual

20 impaired. I can tell from personal experience

21 I am the only person in the room who got lost

22 international traveling on a train.

23 I was in Belgium, they changed the

24 platforms on me. I didn't understand anything.

25 Went and sat on the train. Went to sleep, the
159

1 next thing the conductor comes in and looks at

2 me with a guy that doesn't speak English. He

3 says, "Sir, can I see your ticket." Looks at

4 my ticket. And he said, "Where are you going?"

5 I was going from Brussels to Agrium but took

6 the wrong train because I couldn't understand

7 the announcements. I was in Paris. I have a

8 distinction of gets lost internationally on a

9 train.

10 So to me also I think when I was -- to me

11 when I thought about the ADA community was

12 mobility, seriously. I always thought -- I

13 never thought about that people could be

14 visual. I understand the visual, but people

15 who can't hear, I only got (inaudible) talking

16 to a few folks here and that is very important.

17 I'm selected with a committee, or not

18 selected to the committee, that is besides the

19 point. But I will take this note very strongly

20 and also talk to my superiors that we have to

21 do something about people who cannot hear. Put

22 bigger screens. In Siemens vehicle we have

23 bigger monitor, destination signs. But not for

24 all the announcements. We will try to make it

25 within cost effective means. And I think this
160

1 is very unique.

2 I'm probably the only person in the room

3 with a system engineers for ramps and

4 (inaudible) specifically and who deal with

5 compliance issues. One phone call, if someone

6 felt the ramp was unsafe and the system came to

7 a screeching halt. So I'm going to ask

8 everybody to please vote for me so I'm selected

9 in the committee. I would want to be part of

10 this movement and bring it forward and I will

11 be as much help as you want.

12 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

13 And questions? First is Dennis.

14 MR. CANNON: I enjoy all your TV ads, by

15 the way.

16 MR. SINGH: I'm not on TV. My company is.

17 MR. CANNON: Exactly what do you actually

18 build, rail cars or do you do the systems

19 within them?

20 MR. SINGH: No. We are complete rail car

21 builders. We are leaders in light rail

22 manufacturers in the U.S.A., Siemens Light Rail

23 Systems Division. And we have retrofitted a

24 few cars in the past. And we are going into

25 Metros, single level, double level Metros in
161

1 the future, perhaps high speed system also.

2 MR. CANNON: We have representatives from

3 Bombardier and Talgo and what do you bring that

4 is different from what they are going to bring?

5 MR. SINGH: I think, first of all, if we

6 have Bombardier and Alstom, I will not be in a

7 supermajority. A minority, first of all, make

8 it clear. Second thing, I am uniquely

9 qualified I work in the engineering office and

10 when there is a problem I also work on the

11 trains.

12 I work people ramp system, is a system

13 that is not mechanical. Majority we want

14 certain people going on especially -- I was

15 joking with someone. I said, "I got a Ph.D. in

16 braille because I had to get molds made twice."

17 My molds got made in Europe and they have a

18 small cylinder on top of that is a small dome.

19 In U.S.A. Type 2 they are asking for only dome.

20 I got the dome made. And then I had all the

21 words in upper case because I put (inaudible).

22 I never knew that. Finally I spent on each

23 push button, we spent $12,000 on new modes.

24 Learning experience. I learned when I started

25 going to outreaches.
162

1 And today I met few folks here who are

2 visually and audio hearing issues and that is

3 another thing they are also part of the ADA. I

4 was not strongly aware of that issue before.

5 I'm uniquely qualified. I can go back and work

6 with the OEMs and work on the RFPs.

7 I was talking to somebody if you want

8 something done, it has to be put on the RFPs.

9 We in the car business pay much more attention

10 to that.

11 MR. CANNON: You are the representative?

12 MR. SINGH: Yes, I am the representative.

13 MR. HART: From a technical standpoint,

14 Siemens is in vehicle production -- I don't

15 want to slight Talgo, but Talgo, to my

16 knowledge, does not do light rail in any volume

17 compared -- I am wondering if you are able to

18 speak to some of the Siemens available overseas

19 and not currently available here, or very

20 accessible street cars has huge features that

21 we don't see in the U.S. market.

22 Ultimately, I think, knowing the Access

23 Board, they are going to be interested in

24 hearing from all the manufacturers about what

25 is available not just in the U.S. but overseas
163

1 and what can be brought to the U.S. market that

2 is not currently here.

3 MR. SINGH: I have a really close

4 communication with our -- we call them Center

5 of Competence, the COC in Europe. And I tell

6 you that U.S.A., ADA requirements are much more

7 strict than European requirements. We will in

8 future produce 100 percent low floor vehicle

9 also. If the vehicle is not in level, say,

10 14-inch platform and, say, the vehicle

11 threshold is 14-inches, if it is 18-inch

12 because of legacy platform, that vehicle would

13 get a ramp and that ramp would be 100 percent

14 ADA compliant. I can assure you of that. I

15 have done it and I provided six ramps that are

16 ADA compliant. And there is no playing with

17 the ADA issue, I'm telling you.

18 I'm a very strong advocate and luckily our

19 leadership at Siemens support me 100 percent

20 and they want these vehicles to be ADA

21 compliant.

22 We have a platform at 70 for Houston,

23 Minneapolis and Charlotte, Hampton roads. It

24 is an active suspension vehicle. So the

25 vehicle matches the platform height. Platforms
164

1 are 14-inches, 70 percent, so we have a special

2 area for the ADA people.

3 And, yes, there is no requirement for

4 restraining the seats at this time. It is a

5 good thing to have and if the gentleman is

6 listening, I might suggest that for the brakes

7 and the ramp itself -- because when I was doing

8 the outreach in San Diego, I talked to one of

9 the gentlemen, he said, "Okay, if someone put

10 as restraint on my seat, how am I going to undo

11 that?" Because there is not just one type of

12 ADA.

13 A kid moving the thing with his head,

14 cannot put the restraint on his head. Light

15 rail is different market. Metros are slightly

16 different and high speed. Would be slightly

17 different. We are working on a train 125-miles

18 an hour vehicle and they will get a pressure

19 sealed door system.

20 Now, the issue is how do we integrate cap

21 filler, a bridge plate or step on that.

22 If I'm on the team, I will also try to

23 propose some operational suggestions to the

24 committee, how the doors and ramps need to

25 interact. Because for the high speed trains,
165

1 the doors is a pressure sealed system,

2 otherwise the ears would pop. To integrate a

3 step that is also comparative can be done.

4 There is some things we discuss on the

5 committee. Hopefully they can also be codified

6 and hopefully another them is I bring because I

7 deal with so many cities with the ADA issue,

8 every city have their own requirements, which

9 is not hard to meet. Just a software change.

10 But it will be very good to have a

11 standardized response, beepers, push button

12 lettering, annunciation, fold-up seat, not

13 fold-up seats, all those things. I personally

14 feel I bring a very unique perspective.

15 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

16 MR. SLAUGHTER: To speak of the breadth of

17 ability in Siemens, right, now Amtrak is

18 procuring new locomotives from Siemens. On the

19 other end of the spectrum from accessibility

20 standpoint, we have a power slided door for

21 accessing our bedroom in the new sloping cars.

22 The controller for that is Siemens controller

23 and software. So corporately there is a lot of

24 ability there that should not go unnoticed.

25 CHAIR ALTOM: Awesome. Thank you.
166

1 MR. SINGH: I'm currently working on a car

2 vestibule doors. The issue do we put push

3 button or all that. I propose the vestibule

4 doors have a sensor on the top, totally

5 touchless system. Somebody with the visual

6 mobility, they don't have to press any button,

7 the door open itself, and stay open for some

8 time and close back. There are many things

9 that can be done. Control is an important

10 thing but a simple thing to do. And hopefully

11 we can move further on.

12 CHAIR ALTOM: Next up. We need to role

13 because I have to get my break here.

14 MR. PHILLIPS: I just want to let you know

15 unfortunately I have to go. I have a prior

16 commitment. I just want to voice support for

17 HLAA's membership and to make a point about

18 that Marilyn made about needing to maintain a

19 balance on the committee. I know all -- the

20 new applicants are wonderful, but I think it is

21 important to maintain that balance.

22 CHAIR ALTOM: Paul will get with you and

23 we will get your votes before you get out of

24 here.

25 Last but certainly not least, Washington
167

1 Metropolitan Area Transit.

2 MS. BUNALES: Operator, would you unmute

3 Glenn Millis WMATA.

4 OPERATOR: Glenn's line is open.

5 MS. BUNALES: Whenever you are ready,

6 Mr. Millis.

7 MR. CAPOZZI: He is on the Red Line.

8 (Chorus of Laughter)

9 <<<: It keeps jamming.

10 MS. BUNALES: I can barely hear you as it

11 is. Can you go to handset, please.

12 Operator, would it be better if we

13 disconnect WMATA and have you dial right back

14 using the number on the list?

15 OPERATOR: Are you asking me to dial out

16 to Glenn? Glenn, are you on the phone? I can

17 certainly try to dial back out to him, if you

18 would like.

19 MS. BUNALES: Okay.

20 I take it there is no WMATA in the

21 audience.

22 CHAIR ALTOM: Any other groups in the

23 audience that wish to join that was not on our

24 list?

25 MS. BUNALES: Glenn is disconnected and we
168

1 are going to try to get him back. There is

2 activity on the call here. Hopefully the line

3 is better. I do see Glenn Millis back in the

4 room.

5 MR. MICHEL: I just had a suggestion while

6 we're waiting. It would be good in the

7 interest of time if we were able to establish

8 which type of representation we have here at

9 the table and where they fall and what

10 categories they fall into so we can better

11 establish what we're missing and what may need

12 to be addressed as far as voting in the new

13 committee members and whatnot.

14 MS. BUNALES: I do not have WMATA. I do

15 not know why.

16 MR. BEATTY: We can do that. In our

17 balance plan for the advisory committee, we had

18 essentially four categories. People that are

19 providers that operate rail vehicles,

20 suppliers, essentially manufacturers,

21 organizations and others.

22 So when the applications came in, we broke

23 them into the categories. There are 23 members

24 currently on the committee. Soon as I find my

25 table.
169

1 MS. LINTZ: Why is Washington, D.C., not

2 here? Because they are in Washington. Not to

3 be like demanding --

4 MR. BEATTY: Except for New Jersey

5 Transit, we had a nomination period and the

6 opportunity --

7 MS. LINTZ: No, no.

8 MR. PEREZ: Why aren't they physically

9 hear?

10 MS. LINTZ: Did they not know how to take

11 the Red Line to Metro Center? I'm being honest

12 in the question. I think that is important.

13 We want people here as stakeholders who

14 are committed to this process and -- I

15 understand they were not initially in the

16 thing. I would not be asking those questions.

17 I would just want to know if people can come

18 here -- if this is important to people, we want

19 the people who are committed and we want people

20 who are going to show up. And if you can't

21 come from Washington, D.C., to come to this

22 meeting, it is concerning and I think it is

23 fair to ask. Why are you and your alternate

24 not here?

25 MR. BEATTY: I don't have the answer.
170

1 When you get them on the line you can ask.

2 In terms of Jonathan's question, we

3 currently have 234 organizations. Just to read

4 off (reading).

5 <<<: Do you have a number for each of the

6 general categories?

7 MR. BEATTY: For manufacturers we have

8 four, for disability organizations we have

9 eight, for providers we have four and for other

10 we have seven. So four manufacturers are

11 represented by 17 percent. Eight disability

12 organizations represent 34 percent, roughly 35,

13 four providers represent 34 percent and the

14 other falls into about 30 percent. And FRA is

15 a member, but they are not classified and they

16 are not included in that number of 23.

17 MR. HUNTER: Can you go slowly go through

18 your list of what of the 23 members fall into.

19 MR. BEATTY: I can do that. Alstom,

20 manufacturer. American Council for the Blind,

21 disability. Independent Living, disability.

22 Bombardier Transportation, manufacturer.

23 California Department of Transportation

24 Division of Rail, provider. Environmental

25 Access, other. Community Transportation
171

1 Association of America, other. Disability

2 Defense Fund, disability. Hearing Access

3 Program, disability. International Center for

4 Accessibility Transportation, other. Maryland

5 Transit Administration, provider. West and

6 Northeast Community Rail Transit, provider.

7 National Association of the Deaf, disability.

8 International Council of Independent Living,

9 disability. National Disability Rights

10 Network, disability. National Railroad

11 Passenger Corporation, otherwise known as

12 Amtrak, provider. Parson Brinckerhoff, other.

13 RailPlan International, manufacturer. Ricon

14 Corporation, other. Southwest Transit

15 Association, other. Talgo, manufacturers.

16 United Spinal Association, disability.

17 CHAIR ALTOM: Dennis, you had a question?

18 MR. CANNON: I have a question in terms of

19 the kinds of things we are going to try to

20 write regulations for. We heard discussion

21 that the provisions for light rail, for

22 example, in the reg really covers street cars?

23 Street cars are kind of a new and different

24 thing.

25 Of the people who are operators, I'm
172

1 interested in how many operate heavy rail,

2 rapid rail. Can I see a show of hands? One --

3 (Simultaneous Discussion)

4 MR. HART: Clarify. Everything rail?

5 MR. CANNON: Subway systems. So there are

6 several, right? Three? Four. Commuter rail

7 we have quite a few? Inner-city is only

8 Amtrak? Oh, you're right, you guys. And

9 manufacturers because I'm interested in whether

10 we are going to have -- whether we need -- if

11 we need to write a separate section for street

12 cars, we need to know what the differences are

13 between that and a light rail.

14 So of the manufacturers, how many build

15 light rail cars? One? Two. And heavy rail,

16 I'm assuming, and probably commuter? Okay. So

17 we have got people who can speak to things like

18 the need for standards that might be different

19 for light rail already on the committee. Okay.

20 That helps.

21 CHAIR ALTOM: Were we ever able to get

22 Mr. Millis?

23 MR. CAPOZZI: We have him on the phone

24 now.

25 MS. MARTIN: Linda Martin, FRA. I had a
173

1 question because the gentleman from Siemens

2 brought up the gap-filler question quite a bit.

3 It is one of the biggest challenges we have for

4 inner-city rail, has to do with the gaps and

5 the gaps that are created. So I'm just

6 wondering if the other manufacturers here have

7 similar solutions and whether only Siemens

8 could bring that sort of knowledge to the

9 table.

10 MR. GAGNE: I believe the gentleman from

11 Siemens was talking about gap feeders -- we

12 have some solutions as well for light rail.

13 For heavy rail, I don't remember seeing one,

14 except for something that is portable for not

15 electric or automatic.

16 MR. CORAN: We have a gap filler in Europe

17 that is on the general system. What we will

18 call intercity commuter rail in this country.

19 CHAIR ALTOM: Where are we --

20 MS. BUNALES: Operator is dialing the

21 number now.

22 CHAIR ALTOM: We need to take a break in a

23 moment. We do have a couple of gentlemen. My

24 CART is ready. She told me she works for two

25 hours and hits me on the back of the head. It
174

1 has been two hours.

2 MR. GRETHER: Paul Grether with the APTA

3 street car subcommittees. The issue of gap

4 fillers, the subcommittees has prepared a white

5 paper and has done research on light rail and

6 street cars using bridge plates and all those

7 technologies. That is a real hot button for us

8 because the current regulations predated a lot

9 of that technology and there are some real

10 accessibility barriers we identified there that

11 we would like to share with the group.

12 MR. SAUCIER: First, for the record, Ricon

13 does have a bridge plate device fitable in many

14 different systems, light and heavy rail.

15 As far as the question, the gentleman at

16 the microphone mentioned a white paper. I

17 would be interested to take a look at it. If

18 he could get with me afterwards and tell me

19 where I could find it.

20 MS. BUNALES: I have a note from the

21 operator, that no dice. Voice mail message on

22 the cellphone number.

23 MS. MAZZ: We left voice mails on two

24 different phone numbers.

25 MS. BUNALES: Am I altering the ballot
175

1 again?

2 CHAIR ALTOM: What is our pleasure?

3 MR. CAPOZZI: I would address the rest of

4 them.

5 CHAIR ALTOM: I know on our ballot that we

6 have they are listed. Vote how you would like,

7 is what my suggestion would be. They have had

8 ample time to be here.

9 So I suggest that we hand out our -- if we

10 are ready for those. If we let folks have

11 their ballots --

12 MS. GOLDEN: I thought you said we were

13 going to go through all the presentations and

14 if we had any discussions we will have that.

15 CHAIR ALTOM: We will do that too but I

16 want the ballots. I want everyone to have the

17 lists out. We can have our discussions. We

18 can hand the ballots out and we can take a few

19 minutes of a break too so folks can see a man

20 about a dog, as we like to say in the south.

21 Say 15 after we are back.

22 (Whereupon, a recess was taken

23 from 4:07 p.m. to 4:17 p.m.)

24 CHAIR ALTOM: As we come back, we passed

25 around the ballots and you should have a ballot
176

1 in front of you.

2 Any more discussion anyone would like to

3 have? I know Marilyn had mentioned we would

4 have discussion again. I would like to honor

5 that. Anybody have any last discussion they

6 would like to talk about any of our potential

7 applicants here?

8 MS. GOLDEN: I was going to say the thing

9 about -- we talked about New Jersey and the

10 lost and finding of their application. I don't

11 know, that just seems compelling more to me. I

12 think they would be on if that didn't happen.

13 I appreciate the Board being honest with that.

14 Paper mistake anyone can make. And there is a

15 fairness argument somewhere in there.

16 CHAIR ALTOM: Any other comments or

17 questions?

18 MR. MICHEL: I just think it is very

19 important for us to be voting for the most

20 positive outcome. I don't think anybody who

21 has presented for inclusion in this committee

22 has given us any reason why they are coming to

23 the committee for anything but a positive

24 outcome. And I know we are concerned about

25 balance. And given the numbers that Paul gave
177

1 us earlier, I don't think that would be in

2 jeopardy. So that is just RailPlan's position.

3 And I think it's a good thing that they

4 presented.

5 MR. HOLBROOK: Just by the numbers that

6 were given here, even with two or three more

7 service providers added and an additional car

8 builder, we still don't come to the numbers of

9 advocacy groups and others. I don't see a -- I

10 see it creating a better balance.

11 MR. HUNTER: I concur as well. I think

12 looking at the makeup, even with the inclusion

13 with the people today, we still have a very

14 good balance, people that are representing some

15 of the best and brightest minds in the industry

16 coming from the angles that are important,

17 which is the disability community. So we know

18 what the needs are from the supplier industry

19 so we know what the abilities are, and from the

20 transit providers who implement these for many

21 years to come operationally and as far as

22 equipment.

23 I was favorably impressed with all

24 participants, except WMATA. I think Janice

25 brought up a very good point. Siemens had
178

1 somebody fly from Sacramento to come here -- a

2 painful journey I'm very familiar with --

3 (Chorus of Laughter)

4 MR. HUNTER: -- just in order to make

5 their appeal. They want to participate and

6 contribute. And I think it is surprising that

7 I walked from Metro Center here in about five

8 minutes in the freezing bitter cold that I'm

9 not used to and that WMATA didn't come. And I

10 think Janice made a good point. We need people

11 who will show up and contribute.

12 I think the six we talked to all made some

13 pretty good arguments. Anyway, that is my

14 personal take on it.

15 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

16 Dennis?

17 MR. CANNON: Yeah. Points taken, but --

18 well, let me put it this way. One of the

19 things that we don't really need is American

20 Public Transit Association. That may sound

21 weird because it is a train organization.

22 On the other hand, if we put APTA on the

23 Board, we should probably get rid of all the

24 other operators. That does seem to me

25 overkill. APTA has all the good folks, we
179

1 already determined, who are riding the systems

2 of the various types and the manufacturers who

3 make the cars and the various types are already

4 here. Having APTA would be nice to say "APTA

5 endorses it," but I don't see that they are

6 adding anything.

7 I would also like to say that I think

8 notwithstanding the comment from the gentleman

9 from Amtrak about Q'Straint, first of all,

10 there is no such thing as a universal tie-down.

11 There are none yet to be developed that are

12 automatic, except the ones from Portland, which

13 require a substantial modification in the

14 wheelchair before you can use it.

15 I think we are in -- look at the number of

16 different chairs in the room. My chair won't

17 work in Q'Straint except I made modifications

18 to it. The idea it might be nice having

19 something secured in the train, I don't think

20 is practical. Let's face it, in a crash

21 situation all bets are off; no securement

22 system will hold a wheelchair in place. That

23 is true of buses too. Bus goes and crash --

24 The Q'Straint person said the Chair is not

25 supposed to move two inches in any direction.
180

1 That is a portion of the securement

2 specification itself. So that doesn't apply

3 when there is no securement required.

4 MR. WEISMAN: I just wanted to mention the

5 restraint systems too. While I realize that

6 moving trains and wheelchairs not being secured

7 has always been an issue, I always think that

8 if we change the standards to require

9 restraints, it would be a way to keep people

10 off -- or it would end up keeping people off

11 trains and not getting them on.

12 When I started doing this work, that was

13 always the issue, "You are going to get hurt."

14 But people were willing to take the risk, or

15 whatever you want to call it, because they

16 wanted to travel.

17 It used to be, "You shouldn't go upstairs

18 in the building because if there is a fire and

19 the elevator is out of service, you are stuck

20 up there. So we will do the right thing for

21 you and keep you out of the building." And we

22 have come a long way since then.

23 But I always have a fear the safety issue

24 is a double-edged sword. It would be great if

25 it was universal; it would be great if it was
181

1 easy.

2 The fellow from Q'Straint may have

3 business development in it. I might be wrong.

4 Obviously there is business to develop here.

5 We don't require it now. Maybe we will end up

6 requiring that after we have our discussion and

7 Q'Straint can develop the business. I don't

8 know we want business development. I am

9 probably being mean and probably makes the

10 world safe for democracy too.

11 You know, I just feel a little awkward

12 about that, having restraint as a component.

13 If we decide it is a component, then they get

14 involved, I guess, where we are going with it.

15 CHAIR ALTOM: Stan and Robert.

16 MR. HUNTER: I would just like to

17 respectfully disagree with Dennis on APTA. I

18 worked with APTA for many years on standard

19 development. They have developed and proved

20 hundred of standards and rail things like

21 emergency preparedness, signage, lighting,

22 structural, inspection, maintenance and I can't

23 even name all of the topics because there are

24 so many. And they do it through a consensus

25 process, representing large transit operators
182

1 to the small ones who could never be

2 represented because they don't have the staff,

3 small agencies, Houston, Phoenix.

4 There are a number of small agencies that

5 APTA would be able to represent via liaison of

6 this group and the dozens and dozens of rail

7 systems operators throughout the country.

8 And I think it would also lend a degree of

9 credibility to us that we are bringing in a

10 companion standards organization that

11 represents exactly what we are doing. We are

12 doing standard development for transit

13 vehicles. And who would be better on our group

14 than the American Public Transportation

15 Association.

16 CHAIR ALTOM: I have Robert and Blair and

17 Marilyn and John and Ross.

18 MR. CARLSON: I would like to point out

19 here in D.C. a lot of rail cars, most, if not

20 all, have a wheelchair securement in the corner

21 in an alcove by the door. In 19 years of

22 riding, I have never used or seen anyone use

23 one to the point you don't want to be stuck in

24 the corner with a crowd around you when you

25 want to get off.
183

1 The other point, more times than not I

2 have been someone else's securement --

3 (Chorus of Laughter)

4 MR. CARLSON: -- trying to keep them from

5 falling over. With a much lower center of

6 gravity, I have never had that concern. It is

7 still an issue of where to sit and how to be

8 most efficient in sitting in a car and I have

9 noticed a number of people who have adopted

10 good seating positions that minimize the impact

11 on other passengers.

12 But, again, it is not something that you

13 can teach. It is not something that you can

14 codify in any way. But the idea, maybe it can

15 be addressed in some way, but I don't know that

16 it is yet ready for a requirement.

17 CHAIR ALTOM: Blair.

18 MR. SLAUGHTER: I have two things I want

19 to address. One is the issue of APTA. In 1990

20 APTA existed primarily as a group that

21 represented suppliers to the industry. And it

22 was not even taken seriously by a lot of people

23 at the railroads.

24 Now APTA has since picked up what was long

25 the responsibility of the American Association
184

1 of Railroads and other things that had been --

2 that did not have a home, as the rail mass

3 transit industry in this country dwindled

4 almost to nothing.

5 And what has come out of APTA, I think,

6 has been, to Stanton's point, invaluable to the

7 industry and to the public. And I think that

8 they would be a vital member and they certainly

9 will be going forward.

10 APTA has taken a lot of very complex

11 documents from the federal side and added --

12 made them understandable for agencies that

13 maybe don't have the depth of technical

14 knowledge who are shoestring operations and

15 even larger organizations, like New York City

16 and Amtrak can always lean back on those things

17 and go, "What does APTA say?"

18 If we have a question on how to do

19 something, I find myself in the APTA

20 recommended practices, first to make sure I

21 don't miss something my industry has already

22 labored over and I don't recreate something and

23 I learned from the beginning where they already

24 sorted things out.

25 So that is my spiel for APTA.
185

1 On the issue of restraints, my point is

2 that -- and it may not need be that we need

3 someone from the manufacturer involved, but I

4 think we do need to have a discussion and start

5 now.

6 If you look at the lineage of

7 accessibility to mass transit back in the 60s

8 when the regs started being crafted, you have

9 to start.

10 As someone who went to work for the

11 railroad not because it was a job -- I picked

12 up everything I was doing and moved from the

13 north to the south, which was unheard of. You

14 can appreciate that, Billy. It was because I

15 felt like I could do something worthwhile for

16 people. It was a good thing to do. You don't

17 get rich at the railroad, that's for sure.

18 But we have to start. And if you -- I

19 always use the example going back to the very

20 earliest days of ADA and wheelchair restraints.

21 Amtrak had wheelchair restraints, as a

22 wheelchair was defined 20 some odd years ago.

23 It was a single clamp that clamped the wheel.

24 Now, if you had someone secured in a

25 wheelchair and put them in a high G accident,
186

1 what you had left was a wheel clamped to the

2 wall. So to your point, that is valid.

3 But I think if we start somewhere -- and

4 it shouldn't be something that we look at and

5 say, "Okay, it is going to be an onerous thing

6 for everyone who has a wheelchair to go back

7 and retrofit everything." Let's start so we

8 can look forward to a point in time where

9 everyone can travel more safely and with

10 complete independence.

11 I think the heart and soul of the ADA, as

12 I remember working with Dennis Cannon years

13 ago, was individual independence, that you

14 didn't need someone always to tie your

15 wheelchair down or make sure you could get to

16 the restroom and those kinds of things. So I

17 think in the spirit of that we have to keep

18 that in mind.

19 Every time Amtrak has a situation, an

20 accident, a derailment, and I will use the one

21 that occurred in Nevada where the truck drove

22 through the side of our train, I see the train

23 sitting in the desert with the smoke pouring

24 out of it, the thing I'm most concerned about,

25 "Did I do my job? Are the things that I did,
187

1 preserving life or taking life?"

2 And I promise you, when you read about

3 your coworkers and your passengers, they are no

4 longer -- they are not anymores. They are

5 people who don't go home because of someone's

6 actions or inactions or carelessness.

7 We have been very fortunate. I don't know

8 of a single incident where we can say there was

9 a major injury, even, from someone's whole

10 chair but I don't want it to ever be.

11 I would say let's consider starting so we

12 can avoid it ever occurring. We can do it in a

13 process as drawn out as it needs to be. I

14 don't want to throw that off the table. I

15 think we can consider those kinds of things

16 without threatening anyone's independence.

17 Thank you.

18 CHAIR ALTOM: Marilyn, John, Ross.

19 MS. GOLDEN: I want to also speak to the

20 application of APTA. It is true that they do a

21 lot of private voluntary standards work and I

22 think they may have been a boon for the

23 industry. I question seriously whether they

24 have been a boon to the disability community.

25 APTA started disability standards and I
188

1 was active on it and got other advocates

2 involved. And they did a good job of bending

3 over backwards to have disability

4 participation, which was a nice gesture for

5 APTA and they have that. And then when the

6 disability groups had the temerity to not have

7 the consensus with the standards on the

8 industry groups, somehow all the activity

9 stopped and there was never an explanation.

10 So we have not heard anything from them

11 for years for groups we were on.

12 You know, I don't want to hold old gripes

13 against organizations when things are not

14 problematic anymore, but some of these events

15 are quite recent. I have not seen a lot of

16 interest out of APTA for supporting

17 accessibility. So I don't think they are

18 appropriate here.

19 I think Dennis is hearing if providers are

20 fungible, put them on and take everyone off. I

21 don't think that makes sense either because

22 different providers have different needs. And

23 I'm sorry they won't get my vote today.

24 The thing about Q'Straint, Bob said a lot,

25 I'm filled with terror when I think about --
189

1 someone is always around in a bus. But the

2 idea of being secured in a train and you can't

3 get yourself off, I don't even want to think

4 about it.

5 And the idea of rail as a marketing

6 opportunity is of great concern.

7 CHAIR ALTOM: Thank you.

8 MR. HOLBROOK: Blair covered most of what

9 I wanted to say. In regards to APTA, a lot of

10 good regulations. Seem as though they revise

11 them a lot. Wasn't aware of the last one and I

12 pulled one up and it was a totally new format.

13 I think there is overlap with things with

14 emergency lighting, signage, things that are

15 put on paper. And believe me when the specs

16 come out, the consultants and the authorities

17 to fill it up with as much APTA compliance they

18 can get.

19 I think from the standpoint of -- I think

20 there is some cross-work there we would benefit

21 from and maybe get things incorporated in their

22 next revision.

23 MR. CAPON: On APTA I would draw the

24 analogy with Railway Advisory Committee where

25 the railroads and individual railroads are
190

1 represented and I don't think there is a

2 redundancy, so I'm voting for APTA.

3 MS. LYONS: Maybe I should abstain and I

4 am not going to. I am on the APTA Executive

5 Committee. They are meeting today. May be why

6 WMATA is not available today. Keep an open

7 mind why they are not here today. There are

8 reasons people are not here today and maybe

9 tomorrow.

10 I don't know if anyone knows about

11 Quantum. I know no one has talked about it.

12 It is a bar that comes down, a product they are

13 working on now. And it could be something.

14 Use an open mind. You may not be stuck. You

15 may be able to get it away from you or

16 whatever, you know.

17 I think we should keep an open mind. I'm

18 not advocating restraints or procurement, but I

19 think we should keep an open mind and hear

20 what's out there. I do agree we don't need a

21 product development person on the committee. I

22 don't think that is the what this committee

23 should be about.

24 Back to APTA. I think with all the talk

25 about APTA, if APTA were to be welcomed to the
191

1 table, I think there is a mandate for APTA to

2 do some work and I think that hopefully with

3 relatively new leadership that message will be

4 received. Whether they are allowed at the

5 table or not, obviously I will go back and

6 share some things that have been said today.

7 I don't think shutting them out is a way

8 to get things done. I think whether they are

9 at the table or not, I think dialogue with APTA

10 would be really helpful. They are going to

11 comment on the regs anyway.

12 So I just think -- but I would also, if

13 they are not at the table -- I hope it is not

14 just one person. I hope APTA will make sure

15 the guys and gals are on the standards

16 committee know when the meetings are so they

17 can listen in or people in the industry can

18 keep up with what is going on, rather than

19 waiting to hear about it at the last minute.

20 I don't think that is a healthy thing

21 either. There may be healthier ways to do it.

22 I ask people to keep an open mind on all

23 the things that is really bothering people. We

24 should probably listen to what other people

25 have to say.
192

1 CHAIR ALTOM: Justin.

2 MR. VONASHEK: I just wanted to echo what

3 Stan said about APTA. I think it is extremely

4 important to allow them at the table and there

5 is a lot of value in what they bring. And Paul

6 spoke about street cars. And we don't have

7 street cars represented here. And I think that

8 is extremely important for street cars. I

9 think we should reconsider, some of us, and

10 allow them at the table sauce.

11 CHAIR ALTOM: Say your name please.

12 MR. SAUCIER: The other Stanton.

13 I just want to reiterate what the other

14 Stanton said earlier about APTA, sure -- they

15 have a representative role and represent

16 suppliers and operators, but they have a broad

17 depth of experience with rulemaking and that

18 sort of thinking.

19 With regard to Q'Straint, I'm not willing

20 to condemn them as marketers. The other side

21 of the coin that I think is important, the

22 woman on the right brought up Quantum, a new

23 product that Q'Straint is working on and is

24 representative of something new and different.

25 And new and different is a good thing when we
193

1 are talking about looking forward after what

2 might be new rules.

3 That said, Q'Straint has taken the time to

4 petition the committee and they are not the

5 only restraint manufacturer in the world. I

6 don't know if there is anyone else out there

7 that is trying to. It is a progressive move

8 for them. I think on that basis we owe them a

9 consideration. Thank you.

10 MS. GOLDEN: I forgot to mention this

11 before when I was discussing APTA. The other

12 thing I noticed in their standards programs is

13 when they do an overview, because they are new

14 to the standards program, maybe it is different

15 now, but one of the arguments for it is sort of

16 escapes or avoids government regulation. That

17 is one of the four biggest goals of the private

18 standard setting program.

19 So those of us who have gotten our rights

20 solely through government requirements, find

21 ourselves resistant to that idea and it is just

22 an attitude I wish they didn't have and I don't

23 think belongs in the group.

24 CHAIR ALTOM: Stan 1.

25 MR. HUNTER: I would like to offer a
194

1 counterpoint to that. I have been part of

2 several committees of APTA that have worked

3 hand in hand with the FRA to address the need

4 that either the FRA has identified or the

5 National Transportation Safety Board has

6 identified. And APTA and the railroads and the

7 suppliers and Volpe has all worked

8 collaboratively to develop standards, knowing

9 the standards would then be incorporated into

10 regulation through reference. And we have done

11 it for emergency lighting and signage, side

12 door, structural integrity and crash worthiness

13 of vehicles, all of which have been

14 incorporated in rulemaking.

15 And APTA has been in the leader position

16 for bringing industry, properties the supplier,

17 government, research altogether to a product

18 that at the end 0 the day does the best job to

19 satisfy as many needs of all the constituents

20 as possible in order to come up with a doable

21 result.

22 So I respectfully disagree.

23 CHAIR ALTOM: We have one last comment.

24 MR. HART: I wanted to be clear that I'm

25 going to take all of this commentary back to
195

1 the Board and let all the Board members know

2 the discussion has occurred. For those of you

3 who I know is aware of the history of

4 disability rights in transit, it might be

5 worthwhile to actually take a read, To Ride the

6 Public Buses. I think that would be

7 educational in terms of how certain things like

8 restraints are viewed. It is good to have a

9 discussion and it is very worthwhile to have

10 that discussion.

11 I think the Board was very clear that they

12 wanted this committee to be broadly

13 representative of industry, of folks with

14 disabilities and of provider services. I would

15 just ask that you keep that in mind because it

16 is going to be a challenge to maintain balance,

17 depending on how many folks.

18 With that I would suggest that we vote.

19 CHAIR ALTOM: Good idea. That is what I

20 suggest to. You have your ballots in front of

21 you. Many have filled them out. Those who

22 have not, hold them up in the air. I see

23 Marsha will grab them from you.

24 MS. MAZZ: Only because I can't read them.

25 CHAIR ALTOM: If you notice up on the
196

1 Board, we have our agenda and today we have

2 gotten through almost everything. There are

3 two points we did not make it to and one of

4 those is establishing future meeting dates and

5 the other is the review of current rail

6 guidelines and established comment priorities.

7 We will do the public comment priority before

8 we leave -- committee priorities, excuse me.

9 So what I would like to propose -- and I

10 already see people's heads nodding and I have

11 not said anything -- that we move those two

12 tomorrow's agenda. Because if you look at

13 tomorrow's agenda, you see committee work. I

14 think review of current rail guidelines is

15 committee work. I think that is a perfect fit.

16 Put that in there.

17 Would you like to look at potential

18 meeting dates -- you want to do that tomorrow?

19 Excellent. That leaves me with one final thing

20 that I would like to do is first off see if

21 there are any final comments from here. I

22 would like to get public comment from folks who

23 braved it out for us today, if they have

24 anything they would like to add.

25 MR. HUNTER: One housekeeping idea for
197

1 tomorrow is some folks -- I know I'm speaking

2 for myself. I'm going to be leaving early

3 afternoon. I have to get out to Dulles to

4 catch a flight to go back home. So if we can

5 do things before lunch, such as setting meeting

6 dates and whatever kind of essential for the

7 committee, so we can prioritize tomorrow so if

8 some of us have to leave early we can do so

9 without disrupting the organization.

10 CHAIR ALTOM: That would be my goal.

11 MR. MICHEL: I won't be able to be here

12 tomorrow but I will be calling in and will be

13 on the phone. My presence will be here, just

14 not sitting in the seat.

15 CHAIR ALTOM: Crystal, will you be able to

16 participate by phone tomorrow?

17 MS. LYONS: It would be nice when the

18 meeting date, the time setting would be. I can

19 break away, but, no, not the whole day.

20 CHAIR ALTOM: I think that is the most

21 important thing.

22 MS. LYONS: I thought we were going to do

23 it today, which is the reason to be here. And

24 I was quiet most of the day so we could get

25 through and get priorities done, but that
198

1 didn't work.

2 CHAIR ALTOM: Do we have everybody's

3 ballot? We have them all, Marsha. Thank you.

4 Now, we have an opportunity to hear from

5 the public. Anybody in the audience that has

6 any burning desire to speak and address the

7 group today?

8 Yes, sir.

9 <<<: When will you decide the meeting

10 vote -- will you decide the meeting dates while

11 we are waiting for the vote?

12 CHAIR ALTOM: We have 10 minutes that we

13 could establish the meeting dates. We can try.

14 That may be easier said than done. Bear with

15 us one moment, please.

16 We are fixing to pull up a calendar behind

17 us on the screen and I will read it for those

18 who might not be able to read the screen.

19 Part of our task will be we have three

20 more meetings prior to October 1 of 2014. They

21 discovered new documents for Area 51. Reading

22 the news. For the believers, I'm an ancient

23 alien kind of guy.

24 MR. HUNTER: The minor baseball team in

25 Las Vegas is the Area 51s.
199

1 CHAIR ALTOM: We are looking at the Access

2 Board's website.

3 (Simultaneous Discussion)

4 CHAIR ALTOM: As we are looking at our

5 calendars, if you have your January 2014

6 calendar available, what does the 6th and 7th,

7 which is a Monday and Tuesday -- 6, 7 or 8th

8 January 2014?

9 <<<: Will the next meeting be one day or

10 two days?

11 CHAIR ALTOM: Two days.

12 MR. HUNTER: If you can avoid it on a

13 Monday, because it will take me all day to get

14 back here.

15 CHAIR ALTOM: So what does 7th and 8th

16 look like to the group? Everybody seems to be

17 nodding in agreement.

18 MR. WEISMAN: Wait, wait.

19 CHAIR ALTOM: Look at Jim Weisman.

20 MR. WEISMAN: I don't know how to work

21 this thing. I need a 14 year old.

22 MS. LYONS: TRB is right after that. Can

23 we be real close to that so I don't have to go

24 home and come back?

25 CHAIR ALTOM: Would you prefer 9th?
200

1 MR. CAPOZZI: Our concern is the

2 Continuing Resolution for the government ends

3 on January 15 and there is no predicting what

4 Congress is going to do so we may not have

5 money to meet after January 15.

6 MS. LYONS: I just meant a day or two

7 later than the 7th or 8th. I am not the only

8 one. Several people are going to be going to

9 TRB.

10 MR. CAPOZZI: We can't do it the 13, 14

11 and 15th because that is when the Board meets.

12 MS. LYONS: I meant instead of Tuesday and

13 Wednesday, Wednesday and Thursday or Thursday

14 and Friday. I don't know why you don't want to

15 do the Monday.

16 <<<: What week is TRB?

17 MS. LYONS: The workshop starts on Sunday.

18 MR. CAPOZZI: We can do Thursday and

19 Friday. We can move the webinar to the 10th

20 floor.

21 CHAIR ALTOM: So 9 and 10. How does that

22 look for folks? A bad one for a few.

23 MR. VONASHEK: I think it is okay for

24 everybody.

25 MR. CAPOZZI: That was good.
201

1 CHAIR ALTOM: I thought it was thumbs

2 down.

3 So we will say the 9th and 10th, looks

4 like.

5 <<<: What time?

6 MR. CAPOZZI: Same bat time, same bat

7 channel.

8 CHAIR ALTOM: So January 9:00 from 10:00

9 to 5:00 and January 10 from 9:00 to 3:00, right

10 here in this very room.

11 MR. CAPOZZI: Try April.

12 CHAIR ALTOM: Our next meeting then, if we

13 look at April. Passover begins at sundown on

14 the 14th. You like Thursday, Fridays?

15 MS. LINTZ: Just saying that that is Good

16 Friday.

17 CHAIR ALTOM: The week before. To me

18 every Friday is good.

19 MS. LINTZ: I didn't want to have any

20 religious issues since I'm bringing up

21 passover.

22 CHAIR ALTOM: So what does 10th and 11th

23 look like for folks of April?

24 MR. HART: Sold.

25 CHAIR ALTOM: April 10 and 11.
202

1 We just need one more. See if we can

2 hammer out one more. July is packed with the

3 National Council for Independent Living, I have

4 ADA celebration and a couple of different

5 stabbing things.

6 Do you want to look at the end of June?

7 Stick with our August. We are generally

8 meeting toward the first two weekends.

9 MS. LINTZ: How about the first week after

10 Labor Day?

11 CHAIR ALTOM: That is fine with me.

12 MS. LINTZ: Before the October. How about

13 the 11th and 12th?

14 CHAIR ALTOM: Janice, what is your

15 suggestions?

16 MS. LINTZ: I was thinking the 11th and

17 12th.

18 Does that sound cool to everybody,

19 September 11, September 12 of 2014?

20 Thank you, all very much. You knocked

21 another thing off my agenda. That is sweet.

22 So remember tomorrow morning we will come back

23 here. We will convene back in the room at 9:00

24 a.m. We will pick up with our -- we will

25 announce our new members and then we will start
203

1 right off with our review of current rail

2 guidelines and start to work, get our hands

3 dirty, figure out what our issues are, which

4 direction we go.

5 So any other comments or questions for the

6 day? Hearing none, I will adjourn us until

7 9:00 a.m. in the morning. Thank you all very

8 much. I appreciate it.

9 (Whereupon, at 5:03 p.m. the meeting

10 was adjourned.)

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25