New TRAX cars help give disabled riders greater independence

WEST JORDAN — The Utah Transit Authority has purchased 77 new, low-to-the-ground TRAX cars that allow people who use wheelchairs and walkers to board without a separate platform or a driver's help.

"Now you can independently board the train," Sherry Repscher, UTA's Americans with Disabilities Act compliance officer, told about two dozen members of the disabled community Friday morning during an event to showcase the new trains.

Each $3.6 million Siemens S70-Low Floor Light Rail car has four doors, two of which are equipped with push buttons at the arm level for someone in a wheelchair. When activated, the doors open and a small ramp comes down, acting as a bridge onto the train.

Inside, there's room for up to 30 wheelchairs. People commented on the "new car smell" of the upholstery of the seats that are decorated with the UTA logo. UTA drove the trains along a portion of the yet-to-be-completed Mid-Jordan line, from 5600 W. Old Bingham Highway to what will be the end of the line, Daybreak South Station.

"Once people learn to use it, I think it will be a lot faster," said John Decker of South Salt Lake.

Decker described getting on the TRAX cars currently in use: The doors open to steps, which are impossible for the disabled to navigate, so they have to use separate platforms permanently installed at each station but located to line up with the first car in a train that often contains four cars. Train drivers must exit TRAX and help the wheelchair user with a lift that gets them in the train.

"We've been waiting a long time to get access from the (regular) platform," said disabled activist Barbara Toomer. "It means it's accessible for everybody, and it doesn't single people out from the crowd."

The cars were manufactured in Sacramento, Calif. Design began about 10 years ago, when transit authorities in Salt Lake City, San Diego and Denver paid Siemens USA $10 million each to begin designing such a train. Salt Lake City is the first to get the cars.

The trains are expected to enter UTA's fleet after about six months of testing, UTA General Manager Mike Allegra said.

The trains — half of which were paid for by the Federal Transit Administration, with the other half paid for with proceeds of a sales tax increase residents approved in a ballot initiative — are the same height as other trains in UTA's fleet. However, equipment that's typically at the bottom, such as air conditioning and the propulsion system, is now on top, Allegra said.

The Mid-Jordan TRAX line is part of 70 miles of rail UTA is building by 2015. That line and a West Valley City TRAX line will be open next summer, Allegra said.

e-mail: lhancock@desnews.com

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