Rail Vehicle Accessibility. Towards an Autonomous Train Usage for All Passengers

Accessibility is a key issue for all transport modes and becomes crucial with Persons with Reduced Mobility (PRM), to whom it is necessary to guarantee safe and comfortable train boarding and alighting. The methodology of this study is based on analytical and experimental issues. The first research effort focused on the design specifications of boarding aid to ensure the progress of theoretical concepts into practice. The second activity dealt with a prototypal demonstrator conceived as an adaptive device to bridge horizontal and vertical gaps between train and station platform. A panel of selected PRM tested the device's effectiveness, reliability, and safety. Starting from the design of the testing procedure, the paper describes the outcomes of the experimental activities in simulating and assessing the train accessibility for a heterogeneous sample of PRM.