Note: The output shown below is from the Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) system used in the Communications Subcommittee Meeting #7 and is generally unedited. 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.

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x-----------------------------------------x : UNITED STATES ACCESS BOARD :
: RAIL VEHICLES ACCESS ADVISORY COMMITTEE :

x-----------------------------------------x

COMMUNICATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE MEETING #7

TELECONFERENCE *DRAFT TRANSCRIPT*

Thursday, August 7, 2014

1:00 p.m.

Staff Location: United States Access Board

1331 F Street, NW, Suite 1000 Washington, DC 20004 Reporter: Sandra Gartrell2

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

PAUL BEATTY: We have an agenda. Everybody should have received it by email as well as it is posted on the RVAAC website. So we are ready to start. I want to welcome everybody to the seventh meeting of the Communications Subcommittee.

As you know, anybody may participate in the subcommittee discussions so no time of public comment has been scheduled during this two-hour call.

As you know, we do have CART, but at this point we have not brought up the CART link. So we are asking if anyone participating only by using CART and they desire to ask a question or make a statement, please alert us by sending an email to RVAAC@access-board.gov. So that is RVAAC@access-board.gov. Once we have the chat box up, we will be able to monitor that and let you know at that time. When speaking, please remember to give your name.

As a reminder, this is our last subcommittee call before our full Committee meeting in September. At this point we have not planned the agenda completely.

TERRY PACHECO: Hello. This is Terry and I am thinking we lost Paul, perhaps.

PAUL BEATTY: Paul's still here.3

TERRY PACHECO: All of a sudden you went off in the middle of a word.

PAUL BEATTY: Probably (inaudible). TERRY PACHECO: Did you have anything else you wanted to add, Paul?

PAUL BEATTY: Now I shifted to another microphone. Is this better?

<<<: Sounds good here. PAUL BEATTY: Thank you. Battery must be going dead on that one.

I indicated that in the Access Board conference room we have Melissa and Lisa, myself and no other staff members are present. Jim Pecht, regrettably, had another function he was required to be at. Doing the webinar, that's where Jim is.

I would like to go now to introductions on who is on the line. If you could just state your name and what organization you represent.

Go ahead. So chime in. RALPH CARLSON: Ralph Carlson with Community Transportation Association.

CRYSTAL LYONS: This is crystals Lyons with Southwest Transit Association.

GLENN MILLIS: Glenn Millis, Washington Metropolitan Transit Authority.4

JANICE SCHACTER LINTZ: Janice Schacter-Lintz from Hearing Access Program.

CALVIN GIBSON: Calvin Gibson, Federal Railroad. DON FABIAS: Don Fabias with Multi-K Engineering Services. SHERYLYNN: Sherylynn with Federal Railroad Administration.

LISE HAMLIN: Lise Hamlin, Hearing Loss Association of America.

This is Lise again. Andrew Phillips is also on the line, he is looking at this through CART, National Association of the Deaf.

PAUL BEATTY: That was Lise Hamlin. TERRY PACHECO: And Andrew? PAUL BEATTY: Andrew; okay. TERRY PACHECO: I'm Terry. PAUL BEATTY: Terry, can you hear me? This is Paul Beatty.

TERRY PACHECO: Yes, Paul. PAUL BEATTY: At this point I know we have Andrew and Lise and Terry and Robert and Crystal on the line. Anyone else on the line?

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Blair Slaughter from Amtrak. JANICE SCHACTER LINTZ: I don't know if I unmuted. I'm on the line as well.5

PAUL BEATTY: Anyone else? FRANK MALDARI: Frank Maldari, MTA, New York. PAUL BEATTY: Anyone else? (Chime). TERRY PACHECO: Sounds like someone else just joined us. PAUL BEATTY: At this point, Terry, I will turn it over to you and take it from here.

TERRY PACHECO: Okay. Thank you, Paul. Hello to

everyone. <<<: Hello.

TERRY PACHECO: It is hard to believe -- I can't believe, this is our seventh meeting. In some ways it seems like we have been working together forever and others I would not have thought it would have been that.

As Paul pointed out, we only have one more meeting. This is our second to last meeting before the September 11 and 12 meeting with the Committee as a whole in Washington. And looking over the issues and such from way back in the original meetings in Washington, we have a lot of work to still get done.

What I would like to do today -- I assume you have all seen the email we sent out yesterday with the agenda and that summary, principles. I think that basically -- I just want to see if anyone had any comments on the principles. I think that basically says what we6

have been striving for and what we have been using as a prerequisite and how we have been handling making the decisions we have on the information that is on the updated table, Jim's updated table from our last meeting and that is also included in this document.

I know a couple of people who sent me some emails with some interesting things since then. I am sorry I have not gotten back to you. I have had very intermittent email over the last few days. We are doing some remodeling in our house and at the moment the best thing I have for email is my I-Phone and I am not good at that little tiny keyboard to send things back. So you will all be hearing from me, anybody that has written to me will be hearing from me later in the week, hopefully when I get Internet again.

The footnotes after the tables were the comments that were sent in in the past. I added a couple of things to them when I was rereading it recently. I think they are pretty self-explanatory.

What I would like to know if anybody has any comment on any of this at this point before we move on to some of the other things that we need to be looking at by September 11?

And hearing nothing, we can see that that is completed. Some of the other issues have been completed.7

We still have several things to do and if you look at Item 5-C on the agenda, those things I think we need to discuss today are those numbers 1, 2 and 3. If we can get through these, that will put us in much better stead for the meeting on the 11th.

The first one is how to make stop request devices in vestibules accessible. I would personally like to hear from the rail folks on the call as to what you see the future trains to have for stop request devices in the vestibules, be it in the vestibules or at seating.

I would like to hear from any of you from the various railroad companies on that. Anybody wants to take the ball?FRANK MALDARI: I'll try to answer from our point of view here. The commuter railroads we typically -- there aren't any stop request buttons or any way of indicating such. I mean, it is standard station stops. What we do and how we -- emergency access to the crew, if there is a need to contact the crew for any reason, typically in the vestibule area and typically a button activated switch that connects you to a crew member in an operating cab.

TERRY PACHECO: And is that accessible with a wheelchair and with a sign, raised lettering or braille or something?FRANK MALDARI: That is a good question and I was8

looking at it closely.

Typically on the commuter rails -- I'm not sure if you are familiar with our vestibules, but if you can picture the vestibules, a windscreen as soon as you walk in. And typically all the equipment is usually toward the car side, toward the wall side. So it is located on the door side of the vestibule on the exterior wall. There is currently a button there. It is pretty typical. There is not enough room to put a sign that meets the requirement for raised lettering and braille. It is pretty my -- for the commuter rail it is pretty standard in the size -- I will bring a picture with me when we come to give you an idea.

And, you know, it is accessible. You know, depending on if you happen to be in a wheelchair, you have to maneuver it because it is toward the wall of the car, toward the door, but it is accessible and you can access it. The only thing that you really can't do or the only thing that we don't currently do is have the raised lettering and braille on there. Typically it is a relatively small sign because it is a relatively small panel and a relatively small area there. So it is accessible, but the difficulty would be in trying to make a sign big enough and fit it in the space that is9

available.

TERRY PACHECO: Roughly how much space is it? FRANK MALDARI: It is about 3,6-inches, something like that, about three to four inches wide and -- there is a speaker button that lights after you push it. You push the button, lights on and someone has to answer it in one of the cabs and get back to you.

TERRY PACHECO: Something that is two or three words like "crew connection" something like that, "to contact crew", that can absolutely be done in raised lettering or in braille, no problem?

FRANK MALDARI: If you put "crew connection",but right now there is also instruction on how to operate it. So it is push button, wait for crew to answer and then speak, so it gets to be a lot.

TERRY PACHECO: I was thinking in a 3 x 6 area you could get roughly in braille particularly, you can get about 10 or 12 words.

FRANK MALDARI: The whole panel is 3 x 6. I will send a picture of the sign. You know, it just so happens that is where it is located.

TERRY PACHECO: Right. FRANK MALDARI: Not just a lot of real estate. Typically a windscreen there and something on the windscreen. I mean, it is just the way it is. Not to say10

it couldn't change. Like we said before, once you start putting larger signs on there, it does change.

TERRY PACHECO: Right, I know. I was just curious. Because with that kind of space you could get eight to 10 words in braille, like a braille overlay on the printing could work, as a possibility, as something that can be done. I think the thing we all need to keep in mind with the recommendations we are coming up with, that we are not looking at them so much for retrofitting as we are so much for the future. It is just something that perhaps could be done, you know, new in the future.

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: I wanted to ask Frank, is that emergency communication device, that's coming out of what the FRA has mandated for emergency communication between passenger and crew, right?

FRANK MALDARI: Yeah. JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Okay, okay. So that device functionally is already, you know, is on for new vehicles. And, of course, from the Amtrak side we are in the same situation that a lot of the rail companies are. We run on a schedule and we don't have stop requests, but I think what you would be -- if you look at some of your street cars and trams and things like that, it is probably a little more relevant.11

TERRY PACHECO: Anyone else before I pick on somebody? LISE HAMLIN: I am wondering if somebody -- because it is not our purview, but I was wondering if someone from my regulations could send me what the FRA regs are on the emergency buttons. Because I'm wondering if somebody who is deaf or hard of hearing pushes one of those buttons, how they know someone is responding to them or communicating with them. That's not a signage issue, so I don't want to get distracted here.

If someone could send it to me offline, I would really appreciate that.

TERRY PACHECO: And, you know, it may not be a signage issue but it is a communication issue. That is a very good point, I think.

LISE HAMLIN: Right, right. DON FABIAS: This is Don. I'm representing Steve Rowland with LTK.

Is it possible, listening to Frank, to be able to have like a clear overlay over the existing sign, that overlay has braille, you now, embossed or whatever on it, but you can still look through it to see the regular verbiage? That way it is not taking up additional space, but taking up the same amount of space.

TERRY PACHECO: Overall, yes, it is very possible.12

It just depends on how much verbiage there is. It is very common to see signage that has a braille overlay. It is very doable, but, again, it does depend on how much verbiage there is. FRANK MALDARI: Yeah, but the current ADA regulations -- Tom is your name?

DON: Don. FRANK MALDARI: I'm sorry, Don. The current verbiage for the sign require it to be in a different area and it can't be overlaid. So when we are talking about these things, you are referring back to an ADA standard, an access standard, that requires the braille to be located in an area separate from where the word is.

So, yeah, that is one of the things we had talked about. That is why I was asking is braille important or raised lettering. Because if braille is important -- because there are signs that we currently have that have braille on them and still have small lettering. So you can use the braille. But if you need braille, raised lettering, that becomes a big sign.

And the point I was making at other times is if you don't have the requirement associated with the building standards where you have a lot of room and real estate in which to put the signs, then it is a lot easier to incorporate braille, for one thing. You just missed13

the raised lettering and not have to make a sign that is really big. That is the --

Now, for me, it all depends on the location. But a lot of the signs are in a small area. Currently the fonts are 3/7, inches you increase it to 5 inches and you make it required and allocate a separate space for the braille, which is currently required. You increase the size of a decal four or five times and that kind of impact is pretty big.

You know, putting braille on a decal, like you said, if you make it an overlay, not a big deal, you know. I mean, they do it now. It is not impossible. And does it make it a little more difficult to read? Maybe. But if you didn't have a large lettering that would save you

some. Terry, is that a problem for you? If you think you have the overlay with the braille over the writing itself? TERRY PACHECO: Well, there are a couple of different ways in which to do it which greatly diminish the problem. One of them is there are ways of putting braille with print -- doing it almost like double spacing so that on one line you have the braille and on the next line you have the print. That is one possible way of doing it.

There are other also -- another thing that can be14

taken into consideration is the color contrasting on your print to begin with, the size and the color contrasting.

If you have got a beige background with white lettering, that is going to be hard for anyone to read to begin with and then you put braille on top of it, it makes it more difficult.

Whereas if it was a beige background with black lettering or bolded lettering, it may be a far easier thing for someone to be able to read through with the braille overlay.

FRANK MALDARI: And, generally speaking, our standard is white lettering on a black background. That is typically what we use at Long Island. For some reason the TA uses the opposite. Is one better than the other from your perspective?

TERRY PACHECO: Some people have a preference for one over the other. I heard black background and white foreground. I have heard that being used because it doesn't show up graffiti easily.

FRANK MALDARI: Oh, that is one way of looking at it. TERRY PACHECO: I don't know. I heard that. I wouldn't swear by it but that is my understanding.

CHRIS HART: Hey, you guys. It is Chris. I don't know if (inaudible) is on the call, but pretty sizable15

amount of research looking at why black on white or white on black, all of that. Some of it was I believe, three, four, five -- industry is trying to really backup the overall conventional wisdom. I am not fully versed in that area. We have to send something at some point.

TERRY PACHECO: Chris, that would be great. And if you could connect me with the person that you're talking about, I also have a doctor out in California who is putting -- who is supposed to be putting some backup information together for us as well. I had hoped that he would have it done by today, but that didn't -- has not happened. But he has committed to putting together a considerable amount of information for us. I know he is working with the -- he works for a low vision clinic out on the West Coast and he is putting a lot of information together for us that we can use for best practices and potential requirement alterations.

JANICE SCHACTER LINTZ: When we were talking about the email, the only thing I want to point out, I know sometimes when I receive business cards that have braille, sometimes I can't see the print because of the way the braille is put on.

So I like the idea of putting the braille on a separate line, like the double spacing, like Terry suggested. We just have to be thoughtful that we put the16

braille in a way that it doesn't impair, then, the visual images for people who don't need braille.

TERRY PACHECO: Absolutely. One of the issues on why you have so much trouble reading business cards that have braille on them is that business cards -- the print tends to be in such small font. You rarely see a business card with a font of more than 10 points, if that. That is part of where your problem is with that, absolutely. That is why I have not brailled my own cards because I have not figured out how to solve the issue of putting braille on and making it visible. The only stuff I have seen people will put a sticker on back of a business card with everything in braille on the back.

TERRY PACHECO: Yeah. And the other thing too is perhaps not to use 8 or 10 point print. Anyway, we are getting totally --

JANICE SCHACTER LINTZ: Just something to keep in mind. TERRY PACHECO: Yes. You are making a very good point, Janice. Thank you.

I would like to ask one more question on this issue of the emergency exits.

There was somebody and I know your last name is Miller -- and your first name got me altogether -- from WMATA. I think you would be good where subway cars are17

concerned and you will be putting in the new trolleys in D.C. Do you have anything you can add on the issue?

GLENN MILLIS: This is Glenn. TERRY PACHECO: Glenn, thank you. I couldn't think of your first name. Sorry.

GLENN MILLIS: That is fine. I think a lot of the comments you heard before apply to subway cars. We have scheduled stops, that is it. We try not to, but sometimes we will stop in a tunnel. That is temporary.

We do have buttons for communication in our cars for emergencies and they are accessible, they are brailled. We have one at either end of the car and one at the wheelchair parking area, at the middle door of the

car. And, you know, the decision was made a long time ago to put them in as many places as possible. But those are for emergency purposes and I am not sure they do provide a visual indication. But we do have signage there and while anyone is in Washington you are free to look at those. You will find them on the 6000 and 7000 series cars. We do not have vestibules so that is actually quite outside of our area.

On the trolleys, D.C. Government is going to operate that at the moment. So I can't speak to that. I have not actually seen those cars.18

TERRY PACHECO: All right. Thank you. I was curious about them.

I know the ones on the train you are -- because I had to use one recently when the doors closed before six blind people finished getting off the train and we left a few on the train and a few on the platform and they were from all out of town and it came in very handy having the emergency communication button.

Does anyone else have anything to add on that subject? JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: I'm about to email to you the link for the FRA requirement for the passenger emergency intercom. TERRY PACHECO: Okay. Great. Can you email it to Lisa as well because I don't have email today.

CHRIS HART: Blair, can you send it to Paul so he can keep track of it?

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: To the RVAAC. CHRIS HART: Yeah. TERRY PACHECO: Thank you, Blair. FRANK MALDARI: One thing I wanted to note, I think if you see the requirement you will see it has to be readable in the dark, photoluminescent. And we changed it to be photoluminescent in the dark. That adds more glow out of the sign so you can actually read it in the dark.19

TERRY PACHECO: Okay. All right. The next subject that was on here was the backup power to service emergency notification devices.

Again, I think we -- I know for those of us who are not in the design area, if we put -- if the signs were on -- if everything that we put on our table was on the vehicles today, what would happen in the case of a power outage? You know, do trains have emergency backup power for the notification systems? Anybody?

FRANK MALDARI: Typically our PA and stuff runs off the car battery. So if you lose your main power, for some reason, there is a backup, typically.

You know, as far as exactly what you lose, if you lose main power, that's interesting question. I mean, typically it is the third rail or overhead catenary power or ATP coming across. In all those cases there is a battery backup. I think that is the question you're asking, typically there is.

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Right now there in new equipment there are requirements -- twofold. One with this passenger intercom, there are requirements for, as you were saying, backup power. It says backup power in the regs under the FRA. There is a requirement for backup power for the intercom systems going forward. And we, like Frank, have the interest in all that has always been run off the20

car battery.

But there is with new systems an increasing concern that communication and emergency lighting have battery systems that would take care of damage. And the reason that is done because on most single levels the batteries are underneath the car. So if you have a fairly catastrophic incident where the car is on the ground or rolling, you could lose those batteries. So there are discrete batteries that are closer to the source of, in most cases, the lights with the idea being if you cut the car in half, you wouldn't lose those lights if their local batteries were okay.

So I don't know if we want to get that involved, but certainly there is a precedent out there for those kind of backup systems, if they make sense.

TERRY PACHECO: So I guess -- I'm sorry, can you hear me? JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: I can hear you.

TERRY PACHECO: I wasn't sure if I had muted myself. I guess what I'm saying -- what I'm suggesting -- and I'm wondering what the feeling is of the subcommittee -- should we be making the recommendation that the notification systems that we are recommending, i.e., the induction loop system, any video system,21

anything that is electronic, that is not a static sign, as such, but a VMS, that type of thing, we should be recommending a requirement that they be a part of the emergency backup power system? Does that make sense to folks? JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Can I read what the backup power, PA and intercom systems?

TERRY PACHECO: Please. JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: And this is from 49CFR Part 238.121, emergency communication. It says backup power: PA and intercom system on Tier 1 passenger cars ordered on or after April 1, 2008, placed in service for the first time April 1, 2010. And all Tier II passenger cars should have a backup power system capable of operating in all equipment orientations within 45 degrees of vertical; two, operating after the initial shock of a collision or derailment resulting in the following individually applied accelerations: longitudinal, 8g; lateral, 4g; and vertical 4g. Part 3: Powering each system to allow intermittent emergency communication for a minimum of 90 minutes. Intermittent communication shall be considered equivalent to continuous communication during the last 15 minutes of the 90-minute period.

It is pretty good reg babble, as Dennis would22

say. The preservation of communication, was the intent of this, so maybe the sanity is to piggyback onto that, since we are talking about PA announcements should be replicated.

The tough part is going to be if there is emergency communications going on that gets us out of the world of canned announcements. So that could be a little tricky. JANICE SCHACTER LINTZ: I think it makes sense that it is a really good point that the loop should be on the emergency backup. Because if the system goes down and you can't hear the loop, if we are relying on that for emergency announcements.

LISE HAMLIN: I would agree. I'm not an engineer, but it would surprise me if loop system would draw a lot of power. Maybe we should look into that kind of thing. I would think it makes sense to piggyback.

We could also look whether a visual alerting system, you know, what kind of power that draws and whether it is realistic to also piggyback on the same kind of emergency regulations that are out there.

TERRY PACHECO: Anyone have anything to say on the opposite side?

Then it sounds like we are in agreement on this23

issue. JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Since we are talking about the public address system and we are essentially saying that anything that is going to be broadcast via the audible PA is going to be part -- also broadcast on the hearing loop and ideally individual messaging system as far as practical. Obviously if you are in a true emergency situation that might not work.

It would seem quite reasonable that if we extend what a public address system from purely audible to induction loop and visual, then it almost by default connects itself back to this. That may be something that our folks at the Access Board want to link back to the FRA requirements for the PA so it matches and doesn't conflict. TERRY PACHECO: I think you make a good point. I think you make a good point. I think we want to make sure it -- that the FRA is strong as we are intending here. I think that is the other side of it as well. We need to meet -- I'm just not sure if we need to further clarify that. JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: I think the FRA is talking about what traditional audible intercom systems and having to be functional after an accident. And we are saying that the audible information when it is emergency information,24

largely, needs to be available in other formats. I think to carry on that, you want that system to apply in the same accident and continue working along with the audible PA.

TERRY PACHECO: Yes, yes. I am just not sure -- I need to reread it again in black and white in front of me as part of it. I'm not sure that is completely explained there or if we don't need to add on -- to add a bit more on to it. Making it clear that we do mean that it is not just implied but it is absolutely.

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: I think we need it as part of our language, but how the -- when the Access Board folks start writing the proposed rules, how that meshes so that we don't end up with two different rules and want to say the

same. There is also marking instructions for a passenger emergency intercom and it talks about the requirements for emergency signage for egress -- you will see it so we don't have to linger on it. You will see it. It is a fair amount of description that goes along with everything about this. It at least gives a good foundation of what we want to add for the visual and induction loop systems.

TERRY PACHECO: Okay, great. Thank you, Blair. FRANK MALDARI: Blair, getting back -- I just stepped out and I heard you talking about the non-canned25

messages. JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Yes.

FRANK MALDARI: In an emergency situation that is typically when you use the non-canned message because you are not sure what you are going to say in a situation you were not planning on.

I guess the question is for us it is no problem to do speech to text conversion on the equipment that we have and even the equipment that we would like to buy in the future. So keeping those two tied together is a problem now that I see and I just get worried about regulations that will suggest that you have to do both.

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Well, yeah, Frank, I was saying I don't know if the system remains running, if there is -- if part of the VMS -- I will give you an example. We had some signs at one time that were scrolling signs and they would have messages about one thing and another for Amtrak and every so often they would stop and say "exit this end" or some safety message. That was always the default. So maybe even that is, you know, something that could be considered.

In an emergency situation voice to text is probably going to be even worse because now you have a crew in an emergency situation, depending on the severity of it, the machines ability to translate may get even26

worse. So I don't know what the solution to that is, but it does seem to make sense that carrying the induction loop along since we would be dealing with audible, this would be appropriate. And then maybe something that needs to make sure -- especially if there is a dual purpose of the VMS signs to include standard emergency information. Say if a train passes through a dark situation where the main power is off, you are on emergency power. If the default position for the visual system is to direct where emergency exits are, maybe that is one way of dealing with that. FRANK MALDARI: That is a good point. I am just thinking it -- I think I have seen it on your equipment, most of our equipment as well. You have the emergency information sign, I have seen it on WMATA, where you are giving out all the instruction of what you should do in an emergency, usually a photoluminescent sign. If you lose power, it says "wait for instruction from a crew member."

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Right. Just like on the airline. It is key because we don't want folks abandoning a train, which may be the safest place to be, being hurt by other trains or wires or thing on the outside.

FRANK MALDARI: Exactly. If you are just announcing this is the emergency exit and you don't want to27

tell someone to go out that particular exit, we talked in the past every entry that sways into the car is an exit but maybe not the exit you want to go out -- I am not sure there is a good canned message, I guess I'm saying. You can throw on the signs that would be applicable in all situations.

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: True. GARY TALBOT: If I could chime in, I don't know if Chris Hart is on the call but I can contact him offline.

We were looking to doing that very thing because we knew we wanted dual mode. If someone grabbed a microphone in an emergency that said, "Get off the vehicle and evacuate", something like that, could there be something they flip a button and the signs say the same thing, whatever it is, evacuate? I think might be an option as well, something like that, that may be beneficial, rather than folks sitting down and saying, "Why are folks running off the train?"

LISE HAMLIN: What happens in real life emergency situation for somebody who is deaf or hard of hearing is they turn to the person next to them and they say, "What is happening?" and people are really good about trying to tell them what is happening. The problem is when the hearing people don't know what is happening.

So that is when like a sign like that -- again, if there is a major, major problem the sign itself, the28

control for the sign itself gets destroyed, obviously you can't do anything. But I find even in an emergency, hearing people have trouble finding out what is going over the PA system.

So a backup that would say "stay in place," just a canned announcement "stay in place" or "evacuate" someone needs to be trained, not just to speak the announcement; you flip this emergency signal. It would be really helpful. I'm just putting it out there and I'm not saying you have to have voice to text until it is ready. I'm actually pretty content with the principles here and I think it is helpful. Some day in the future we will have voice to text. At that point we will put it in. When we don't have it we can't obviously use it.

In the meantime I think you can effectively use canned messages or it can at least help for everybody on the train.

JANICE SCHACTER LINTZ: Having been in an emergency situation but not a dangerous situation but seven-hour delay because of snow blindness, no one on the train knew what was going on. We asked the conductors passing by; they were too busy to stop and deal with us, hearing loss or no hearing loss. No one next to us knew what was going on because they couldn't hear the announcement. I think it is hard to predict every situation29

and there has to be some sort of maybe likely set where you have something that says "delay" or "stay" or something. And you have to have some provision. As the speech to text changes, the law is not going to come back and change. So we have to put in some provision that allows that once it reaches a point where it can be done. We don't have to come back and change the law.

We have seen before we are having the same problem in other areas with induction loops, where some people will come back and say, "Well, it doesn't say the word 'induction loop.' So when we don't see a word, we don't have to do it." It is irrelevant it didn't exist before. So we have to plan for the future and we have to make sure people are safe and not dependent on the people next to them.

TERRY PACHECO: Anything else? Okay. We were on backup power. We can drift occasionally.

How to make messages accessible when the vehicles are not station-based. Okay. This is something that came up -- I think this is most noticed by people, largely on subways. I'm not picking on WMATA, but since that is the one I'm near most of the time, generally WMATA or the MTBA in Boston. The idea that the announcement is made that this is a red line train to Shady Grove before it gets into the station, when it is pulling in before it has come30

to a stop, making it virtually -- in many, many cases making it virtually impossible to comprehend, to hear, especially if there are other trains, some of these especially loud stations, that kind of thing. It is making those signs, those announcements virtually inaccessible to anybody who is trying to get it audibly.

And I think that is the -- that is my understanding of what was meant when this issue was brought forward in the beginning, you know, a couple of months ago on our list. I think that is what this was about. I know there are -- with prerecorded messages, that seems to be -- that is an issue that doesn't seem to come into play. It seems to be resolved with prerecorded

messages. It sometimes -- I don't know -- I honestly on commuter rails if the announcement is external -- it is an external announcement but it is on the vehicle itself. So that is why it falls under our purview.

Does anybody have any thoughts or comments or suggestions on it?

FRANK MALDARI: External, we have external speakers on a lot our cars now and typically the trick is by the door opening so that not every announcement that goes off in the car is heard on the wayside. So there is an31

announcement that occurs when you are in the station and it is an audible announcement. When the doors are open and it usually goes on outside as well.

TERRY PACHECO: So it is an announcement that says "Blue Line to La La land" or something?

FRANK MALDARI: Everybody has standards. Usually this station is and the next station is this and this is the train to the final destination. It is usually a standard announcement. It doesn't necessarily have to be limited to, you know, to canned announcements. It can be any announcement. The key is where you're tying to. For our equipment we typically tie it to the door opening. You don't want the guy trying to have to figure out exactly where the announcements go all the time.

The one problem that we did have is depending on where the trains are going, it was a lot of people complaining in the neighborhoods about the length and volume of the announcements that were being made when we first put the equipment on a property.

Despite the fact it may be nicer to people on the platform, if you live nearby, they don't like it. You are always fighting competing interests.

TERRY PACHECO: Yes, I know. We had that same issue with accessible ped signals when they were first put in some places. They have been known to be seriously32

vandalized for that reason. And, I'm sorry, but I don't have much sympathy for people who decide that they are having to listen to an announcement or someone potentially getting killed, you know. Guess which one I'm going to side with. FRANK MALDARI: People don't want to hear horns on trains either, exactly. There is always competing interests. TERRY PACHECO: There are.

FRANK MALDARI: To answer your question, you can have exterior announcements and they don't have to be limited to canned messages.

I have the same problem before we got the newer equipment of trying to know where the train was going before you get on it because they didn't have the visual signs on them. So typically the problem was the crew didn't make the announcement until they closed the door and a lot of good it does you then because you are already

on your way.

So having the signs is helpful, but as far as getting the crew to make the announcements when the train is in the station before you get on, that can be done by tying it to the door opening, I think, or instructing the crew to make the announcement like that when the doors are open at the platform.33

GLENN MILLIS: I think we all heard and discussed these things before. It is something that Metro has had to worked at for a long time. I know similar to other places we had speakers on the inside and outside of the cars and some of the older equipment the speakers don't work that well. We have done some upgrades in the past but, frankly, they still don't operate that well.

But on our air equipment we have better speakers and we do have speakers on the outside of the train. They do have to compete with the environment. And, you know, when you have two trains, one parked, one pulling into the station, there is no competition. The train pulling in the station wins noise hands down all the time. But we do have speakers both inside and out.

On the quality and consistency on the messages, is something we have been working on. Frankly, we have had to do it. One of the things we have now are split lines where we have something called "rush plus" where depending on rush hour, what line you are on the trains may turn colors. And we also added a silver line so we have quite a few lines operating on the same track. So it becomes even more important to let customers know what

cars you are on.

We sort of approached it two ways. One is visual. The cars have signs on them that are colored34

keyed. It will tell you the Red Line going to Glenmont. We have also tried to standardize messages. I'm looking for SOP for our operators, which we do enforce, which tells them they have to make certain announcements when the door is open, "This is the Station A. Doors will open on the left/right." When it departs the station, telling the customers again it is the Red Line of Washington, D.C., to and gives the next station.

So we try to do that while the train is in motion and while it is parked. And the advantage of the parked is that, you know, it is being made while the train is in the station. Again competing with other sounds in the station. But if you are standing there waiting for a train, there are speakers on every car in the train and it is telling you this is a Red Line going to whatever, Glenmont or Shady Grove.

TERRY PACHECO: The thing is when you have people making the announcements as opposed to prerecorded announcements, it seems to be a judgment call on their part on when they are going to make the announcements.

GLENN MILLIS: There is a protocol of when they make announcements. Do people do their job perfectly? Not 100 percent thing. We are working toward it and we are getting better. I am not going to say you will hear it every time you ride a Metro train, but the numbers are35

getting a lot better.

But there is an advantage in the canned message in that it does not fail. We have gone to canned messages on our buses. We have automated bus stop announcements.

TERRY PACHECO: Yes. CHRIS HART: Joe, anytime you rely on humans, there is going to be some margin of error, more than you have with mechanical devices.

MELISSA ANDERSON: I know in the bus rule, something that we discussed and was proposed was having automated announcements so that when you pulled into a station that announcement automatically would go off and also having a digitized human voice or computer voice that gave the announcement so that you had consistent clarity. So those might be two things for you guys to consider.

TERRY PACHECO: I personally think that it is far superior. I would really like to see that in the recommendation for the requirements, but I'm sure other people have other views on it.

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: You know, Amtrak is in an interesting situation of having relatively short distances on the corridor and elsewhere in the country having long distance trains. Largely on long distance trains we have strict rules about announcements at night when folks are trying to sleep in the coaches and the sleepers.36

So the way we generally setup, rather than making a train wide announcement, the car attendants on the sleepers and coaches will go because they know where their passenger are. Say they are from Iowa, and they will go and wake that person in the coach or multiple folks in the coach and sleeper so they get off at their appointed station to tell them we are in Iowa. I just want to make sure that we keep that aspect in front of us so we don't broad brush everything.

TERRY PACHECO: I think you are right, Blair. At least in my mind, I'm primarily thinking of that on much shorter trains, things more like subways and trolleys. Maybe some commuter rails, not something that is long distances, Amtrak. For someone who takes the 3:15 a.m. train a lot, that is a wonderful service. I really do like it. JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: We will caveat those kinds of things with the hours of operation and it would make sense on even the corridor trains. The Acelas were built to do just that, but the wayside infrastructure was never put in to trigger the trains. The train has the capacity. If this is an early morning train, you wouldn't want to start making the broad announcements until after 7:00 a.m. or something and not after 9:00 or 10:00 p.m. at night.

TERRY PACHECO: Good point.37

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: If we could just leave a caveat in there for those kinds of operations, that would be great.

TERRY PACHECO: Yeah. And this particular issue was largely external speakers, external announcements, announces two people on the station platform waiting for that train to come in. As far as I know, we wouldn't run into with Amtrak, would we? Because the announcements on the platform are made from the station and not from the train or do you have both?

LISE HAMLIN: The only issue I see with the outdoor announcements when they differ with the signage on the train. If you are going to make an announcement that says "this train is ending at Grovesnor," that is what it should say on the outside too because that is what someone who is hard of hearing or deaf too will depend on those visuals. That is the only one I would want to link to it. I don't see a problem with having an outside announcement I don't hear as long as I can see the sign saying where I'm going. FRANK MALDARI: That is a good point you make. Maybe linking the two is not always a good idea. Because typically when you are outside of the train, the main thing you want to know is where is this train going, maybe not all the stops it is making, because it is a quick thing. In three to five minutes at a station, some of these trains are38

moving quickly and people are boarding quickly. Don't want to have all the information but maybe the more important thing is the end destination, which is typically what we display on the exterior signs. If you try to cram in too much, you don't get the information that is most important.

TERRY PACHECO: I was thinking that when you were saying what station it is and what station is the next one, it would seem the most important information at that point is possibly what station you are in, if it has not made the announcement prior to pulling into the station, which I would think would be a better way to do it. But when it first opens to say, "Green Line train to Glenmont" whatever, that is the first piece of information anyone, especially on the platform, needs to know, is what train it is.

FRANK MALDARI: That is a good point. More on the Long Island sign we have been able to do it with station signs. We have invested a lot of money and have got a lary (ph) signs and speaker and they continuously make announcements and give updates on when the train is coming and where the train is going on each track. Doesn't necessarily have to be a car-borne setup to get the information you need. You can also do it from the wayside.

JANICE SCHACTER LINTZ: While I understand what you're saying, I disagree because in inclement weather it is impossible the see the sign. When I mentioned the snow39

blinding experience, we couldn't see the sign, had no idea, because it really needs to be in the cars. At night it is hard to see it in inclement weather. You should know where you are getting off on the car. We can do it on the MTA. No reason why we can't have it on all rail cars across the country. TERRY PACHECO: That's logical.

All right. Anything else on this topic before we move on? I think we have certainly gotten a lot of viewpoints on all three of those topics today.

A proposed time line for completion. We need to look at how soon we think we are going be able to get all of this done. I think this is something we probably should have put a little further down on the agenda.

But, Paul, would you like to -- are you still with us, Paul Beatty?

PAUL BEATTY: Yes, I am here. I had to turn on my microphone.

TERRY PACHECO: Okay. I'm sorry. I would like to hear what you folks ideal would be for us to have all this done.

PAUL BEATTY: Ideal for having this all done? Well, I guess you would have had some sort of draft in front of you which you would have sent out to the full Committee and they would have gone through and made sure everything40

stated in it was what the Committee wanted to have stated.

I heard a number of ideas regarding the last three issues you discussed. I have not heard anything saying, "Okay, this is what the subcommittee is going to say." There has been a lot of discussion, for example, the last one, on how to make the exterior signage accessible, but what is it that the subcommittee wants their report to the full Committee to say on that issue?

Now, if you are looking for a time line, you know, this is what we eventually want to see when you submit your report to the Board. On these issues these are recommendations that does add to the code language.

Now, in terms of time line, everything sort of leading up to your September 11 meeting, Blair knows, before it goes to the full Committee, the question for me is whether the September subcommittee is making reports to the full Committee for blessings or are they using their time in September for an additional subcommittee meeting. We only have those two days. Probably it all boils down to 12 hours or 11 hours. So it sort of like let's maximize our time and the face-to-face meetings are needed to move things forward in subcommittee, great.

So it is almost like your second set on the agenda after time line regarding the September 11 meeting. And to me it is only getting the subcommittee to get a41

sense of where they are at in terms of what is in the agenda. The table, whether it is complete or not for purposes of communicating something to the full Committee, to get their comment and/or blessing. So that is my thoughts.Any other colleagues of mine want to add anything more? Okay. No one here at the table. So back to you, Terry. TERRY PACHECO: Thank you, Paul.

Okay. So you all see where we are at, what we need do. We got to get a draft put together. Do I think we can have a draft of all of our issues and have it ready to go to the Committee as a whole by September 11? I don't think we can do it on all of it, but I think we can do it on a good number of it.

I think we can also pull a lot together at the September 11 and 12 meetings primarily with some of the things we talked about with doing this markup with the signage and such that we talked about on the last call.

I'm assuming that that is still going forward. I know Blair and Frank, you were the two primary people on that. I would like to open that opportunity up to ask some of the other committees if they want to use it as a demonstration of any of their recommendations so that we can actually look --42

One of the things that I have long felt, and maybe I am just taking a bit of personal privilege here, is oftentimes I have seen, too often where regulations have been passed, regulations have gone into play that once we actually lived with them and discovered they are really not as wonderful as they were going to be at the time. And that is why I am so intent on the idea of the markup and actually walking through some of the proposed recommendations of all of the committees.

I think we need to do that. I think the disability community in general has fallen short in the past. We can come up with several examples of it. We don't need to get into. But we absolutely -- I think the more we troubleshoot something ahead of time, the better off we are all going to be in the future.

I think that makes it better for the people with disabilities, for the transit companies, for the transit engineers, for the companies building these new vehicles. We just -- we need actually -- ideally, if we lived in an ideal world, we would be able to live with something and try it out for a while and see what works and what doesn't. We are not able to do it. At least we are not able to do that on a long term basis. We are not ending up putting up committees like this that has to redo something every 10 years.43

I think we have the potential to at least do some of that with the markups that we are going to do in September. But I do think that we can also have some of our issues -- some of our issues we have put in place, we have agreed on them. At least I think we have a majority vote on most of them.

I would like to -- that is where I brought in the next piece that is right after the agenda, the summaries I put in here of the principles that we have used.

I would like to continue on with this summary based on the issues that were in the original issues document and that I brought up in the table and actually come up with what I plan to present based on all of your approvals at the September 11 meeting. And hopefully actually in there have some things that we are actually ready to take to the Committee as a whole as our recommendations.

I am committing myself to have this done in time to email it to all of you before our next meeting, which I don't have a date of in front of me. My calendar won't come up. It is something like the 5th -- 4th of September. I think it is the 4th.

PAUL BEATTY: There are no more conference calls scheduled for the subcommittee. Right now the next time you will be getting to this is possibly when the full Committee44

meets, September 11 and 12.

Just from a crude planning perspective, if we take the 12 hours roughly and divide them, take some time out for the full Committee, you can say subcommittee has about two and a half hours and they can use that time either to make presentation to the full Committee and allow discussion and/or use that time for subcommittee work. So that Communications doesn't overlap boarding and alighting and you get two and a half hours and no more. How you are going to use that time is up to the subcommittee and the subcommittee chair to decide.

TERRY PACHECO: Thank you, Paul. Okay. Let me ask this question of our committee: Would you have a problem with holding another meeting on September 4?

FRANK MALDARI: I can't make that, that date. I have another meeting I'm going to.

TERRY PACHECO: Okay. How about if we just do this by email? Would that work better for folks?

FRANK MALDARI: I think that is a good idea, Terry. And one thing I wanted to go over before the meeting is over -- and I will let you finish, but I didn't want to get caught off at the end. I wanted to spend five or 10 minutes talking about what we are going to do about the presentation to make sure we are on the same page.45

I think email, if you want to send it around and get input is a good way to go.

TERRY PACHECO: Okay. FRANK MALDARI: I think we will need some time to see what we have in our hands and agree or have discussion on it. Two hours is not a lot of time, even two and a half hours. Being ready to give a report to the Committee I think is a little much for us to be prepared for at that time. TERRY PACHECO: No. I have to give them some dive of a report at that time. I can give them a report, "We have not done anything." I have to do something with them anyhow. I have to give them some kind of status report. Goes without saying. If we can get some of our recommendations solidified by then, we can add those in.

PAUL BEATTY: Terry, in general if you're not going to be making a complete report to the full Committee for purposes of discussing your recommendations, we are just asking for a brief briefing. So that could be just five minutes: "Here are some of the things we talked about, but we are not prepared to give our full report at this point in time" and leave it at that.

So just a quick status -- TERRY PACHECO: Paul, what is the date of the next committee meeting?46

PAUL BEATTY: September 11 and 12. TERRY PACHECO: No; the one after that? PAUL BEATTY: Not until February. TERRY PACHECO: I couldn't remember if it is January or February. I just couldn't remember.

PAUL BEATTY: Toward the end of the month. I don't have the dates in front of me.

TERRY PACHECO: I couldn't remember if it was January or February. That is longer than I think we actually need but it is going to be our option, our only other option, really.

Okay. Thank you, Paul. Let's go on to -- Frank, why don't we go into what your wanted to discuss about the presentation.

FRANK MALDARI: Yeah, okay. What I was planning to do is try to get some good high resolution pictures like the end of the car. I was going to pick one of our pieces of equipment, a couple of shots in the vestibule and a couple of shots in the main passenger compartment and then send that to Blair, who could hopefully scale them up and print them full size. And, you know, we will have a couple of decals and actual size and be able to play around with how they are going to fit on the car and see how it would be on current design.

We talked about using AutoCAD drawing, but if you47

can accommodate printing full-size pictures that can be scaled up, I think that is better for people to get a feel of what is going on.

Does that seem possible for you, Blair? JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: I think so, Frank. The sooner I can get an example, the sooner we can get that scaled up. We have a big color printer and a big black and white printer. The worse case would be if our color printer is big and finicky.

And it would be handy if you put something like a known dimension, like a 12 x 12 --

FRANK MALDARI: Right, what I was thinking so you know what to scale it up to, I wanted to make sure we could get full resolution. And doesn't look like a lot of dimples, but it is also important to deal with full accessibility.

PAUL BEATTY: So if you have something full scale with any information on it, we have to at a bear minimum have a written out description of what it is. So whatever you are sending to Blair, you know, please make sure you copy us on it so we can at a bear minimum right a sort of descriptive.

When you are describing this, I had a picture in mind, maybe this 5' x 8' sheet of paper you are putting up against the wall that sort of shows the full scale size at48

the end of a rail car. Is that what you're talking about, Frank? FRANK MALDARI: Yeah, that is basically it.

PAUL BEATTY: Okay. That is something we have never done before. It would be interesting in terms of the conference room. There is something about I can't pin things against the wall. But if that is what you are planning to do or desire to do, at this point I assume you can do it and I will immediately touch base with your people that control your walls in the conference room and see how I can request about accommodating you and accommodating them in terms of wall mix and so forth.

We will need whatever you are going to do, obviously a small thing, so we can deal with accommodations, description, picture. And if you are putting dimensions on it, obviously we will be including that in the description.

TERRY PACHECO: One of the things with this, Paul, is the thing last week. I was saying we are going to be doing some of the signs. I just wanted to remind anybody that has signage that we can use it to send it to me because I'm going to put together signs in alternate formats to be able to put on -- to use as examples on this markup.

So they will be accessible in and of themselves, as far as braille, large print, that type of thing is49

concerned.

FRANK MALDARI: Terry, do you want -- I mean, we have standard decals I was going to use as an example. Do you want me to send you the actually drawing?

TERRY PACHECO: If you can send something to me so I can braille it, that would be great.

PAUL BEATTY: Melissa pointed out and reminded me that this is not something you should walk in the door on the 11th and say, "Here are my folders" and put them up against the wall.

If you can do one at the bear minimum, maybe you won't use, but maybe as a test example that you can send to us, then we would know where we are going to put it, whether we can and then also how many you are talking about. So do we put them one on top of the other and pull the curtain back and see the next one? So if you can give us a test one and we can make sure we can get a wall -- we just need to set it up before the meeting starts.

TERRY PACHECO: Jim and I had talked about doing it a day before.

PAUL BEATTY: We have a board meeting three days before the 11th and 12th. They will be gone by noon on the Wednesday, sometimes by 3:00 or so. I guess I'm trying to make a point, we need a test to make sure we can put it somewhere and it works and we need the others as soon as50

possible and we have this small window. If you wait until the last moment to get it put up and we don't want to spend full Committee time to try to put these on the walls and everyone discussing where they should go.

We appreciate people's help but we only have the 12 hours, roughly, for the full Committee. So just Frank and Blair, just plan for that in your planning process.

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Frank, as soon as you send something as an example, I will send it out and roll it out and send it down to Paul.

FRANK MALDARI: Okay. I will try to get you something next week. We were trying to make sure we had the right resolution. I was busy doing something else. I'm thinking about, you know, about four or five, you know, five foot wide, you know, sections of the car. Display them all together to get a feeling for what the end compartment looks like. I also wanted to try to get some standard decals and present them up to scale. And I was trying to print a couple of other ones blown up as well. The important thing is getting an idea of the overall space that you have. JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: And I think if we -- if you have raised letter in braille and standard sizing what it would do to a sign. I think those are good bring-alongs51

that we can add and take away to what we put on the wall.

And I think between our two railroads, the things that you encounter that we are concerned about are relevant enough and pretty much across the board when we talk about safety and information that it won't be relevant whether it is your cars or mine or Jersey Transits or whoever.

FRANK MALDARI: Sidewalls and end walls will be pretty similar. The vestibule will vary a little bit. But you really can't appreciate what is going on there unless you see a picture. So I think pictures are good and if we can blow them up enough and not lose the resolution, I think would be a real good way to make a display.

JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Okay. Well, let's give it a whirl. PAUL BEATTY: Send me one as a test copy before you do work on the other three or five so I know we can do it. JOSEPH SLAUGHTER: Okay, Paul. The first thing I get as an example, I will go ahead and blow it up, print it and send it to you so you can get an idea of the scale of what it is going to be.

TERRY PACHECO: Do we have anything else on the 11th? All right. I will start working on the summary.52

If anybody wants to take any part of it and do some work on it, you are more than welcome to. Our next step is I will get something out to you, probably be the latter part of next week. In the meanwhile, I think that pretty much covers our agenda now. An absolute amazing thing, we are running a little ahead of schedule instead of 20 minutes behind as we usually are.

Anybody else have anything they want to bring up today?

<<<: Not I.

TERRY PACHECO: Going twice. I think we are done for this afternoon and I will be in touch with you all next week. FRANK MALDARI: Thank you, Terry.

<<<: Thank you. <<<: Bye. TERRY PACHECO: If anyone doesn't hear from me, just let me know and make sure -- make sure I have your email address.

JANICE SCHACTER LINTZ: Okay. Thank you. <<<: Bye. PAUL BEATTY: Operator, this concludes our conference call. (Whereupon at 2:29 p.m. the meeting was adjourned)