The Rail Vehicle Accessibility (South Central Class 375/3 Vehicles) Exemption Order 2002

Made23rd June 2002

Laid before Parliament24th June 2002

Coming into force16th July 2002

The Secretary of State, in exercise of the powers conferred on him by section 47(1), (3) and (4) of the Disability Discrimination Act 19951, having consulted the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee and such other persons as he considered appropriate in accordance with section 47(3) of that Act, hereby makes the following Order:—

Citation and commencement1

This Order may be cited as the Rail Vehicle Accessibility (South Central Class 375/3 Vehicles) Exemption Order and shall come into force on 16th July 2002.

Application2

This Order applies to the rail vehicles which are numbered 68201 to 68228, 68401 to 68428, and 74801 to 74828 and which form the electrical multiple units numbered 375311 to 375338 of the class known as “Class 375/3” (“the exempted vehicles”) as manufactured by Bombardier Transportation UK Limited for use by South Central Limited.

Exemption

3

Subject to articles 4 and 6, the exempted vehicles are hereby authorised to be used for carriage even though they do not conform with that part of regulation 13(7) of the Rail Vehicle Accessibility Regulations 19982 which requires that the first letter of, and numbers used in, announcements on visual systems on the front of a regulated rail vehicle shall be not less than 70 millimetres high.

4

It is a condition of the exemption given by article 3 that the first letter of, and numbers used in, announcements on a visual system on the front of an exempted vehicle shall be not less than 49 millimetres high.

Expiry

5

The exemption given by article 3 shall expire at the end of 30th June 2003.

6

The authorisation shall cease forthwith if an exempted vehicle is operated by a person other than South Central Limited unless the Secretary of State has been given written notice in advance specifying the name and address of that other person.

Signed by Authority of the Secretary of State for Transport

David JamiesonParliamentary Under Secretary of State,Department for Transport23th June 2002

(This note is not part of the Order)

This Order authorises the use by South Central Limited of specified rail vehicles forming Class 375/3 electrical multiple units, even though they do not comply with one of the requirements of the Rail Vehicle Accessibility Regulations 1998 (S.I.1998/2456, amended by S.I.2000/3215) because some letters and numbers on the visual display screens at the front of the vehicle cannot be displayed at the required size.

This Order imposes a time limit on the authorisation and sets a condition.