Toronto’s subway and train stations, including the TTC’s newest, have design flaws that can make travelling difficult or dangerous for people with disabilities, according to a new video that illustrates the problems.

In a 30-minute video released Tuesday, David Lepofsky, the chair of the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance, demonstrates various problems at Union Station, some of the new TTC stations on Line 1 and some GO stations.

At Union Station, Lepofsky, who is blind, shows how a person walking with a white cane can hit their head on angled pillars on the train platforms. At Bloor GO Station, he points out gaps in the “tactile walking surface indicators” — the bumpy parts of the platform that let blind people know that they’re close to the edge. At the new York University TTC station, he notes only one entrance has an elevator — and on that elevator the braille is mislabelled and confusing, he says, pointing out how the button for the ground floor reads “main.”

“Accessibility requirements are inadequately enforced,” Lepofsky says in the video, adding that he thinks the province’s Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) doesn’t go far enough.

“If you’re going to design a building, do it in a way that everyone can use it,” Lepofsky told the Star. “Everybody gets a disability eventually, if you get older.”

Stuart Green, a spokesperson for the TTC, said some of Lepofsky’s observations are known to the TTC and are being addressed, but the video raised new concerns.

“Mr. Lepofsky’s analysis has raised a few issues regarding the new stations of which we were previously unaware and which will be reviewed by TTC staff for correction or improvement,” he said.

“The TTC is fully committed to meeting or exceeding AODA requirements.”

Anne Marie Aikins, a spokesperson for Metrolinx, said that the company is working on making GO stations more accessible, but there are roadblocks.

“We know we have a ways to go, we’re committed being AODA compliant ... knowing it’s an extensive endeavour working with old infrastructure,” she said.

“Union Station is historic building, so we have to follow the heritage guidelines and make it accessible, so there’s some challenges for sure.”

Lepofsky also said he made the transportation bodies aware of other accessibility concerns before the stations were finished, but they built them that way anyway.

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One example is the platform design at all the new TTC stations, where the platform sits in the middle of the station and passengers can enter a train going either direction.

This gives people who are blind or have low vision no wall to use as a “shoreline” to follow, Lepofsky said, which can be dangerous on a crowded platform.

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