This is part two of a two-part series about paratransit riders’ experiences with the service, the ride scheduling site, and RTA’s website. Click here to read part one, which focuses on late pickups and arrivals and long call reservation wait times.
Using paratransit.gcrta.org to schedule a paratransit ride is not an option for Larry Rodriguez. Instead of using the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority (RTA)’s online paratransit scheduling website, Rodriguez, who has a visual impairment, has to call the paratransit ride scheduling phone line between 7:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. or an automated phone system.
Rodriguez has had to wait 40 minutes to an hour when he calls the phone line. He called the phone line on Thursday around 8:20 a.m. and was the 40th caller in line. Rodriguez primarily uses paratransit to get to Tower City Center, where he works at Susy’s Soup & Deli, and to medical appointments.
Rodriguez relies solely on a keyboard (rather than a mouse) to navigate websites. An automated screen reader reads information from the website out loud. “You are currently on a menu item. To choose this menu item, press control-option-space. To close this menu, press escape,” it read while Rodriguez was showing The Land the issues he’s experienced with the paratransit ride scheduling site on Thursday.
After logging into the scheduling platform, he selects a pickup location for the ride. But when he gets to the next step – choosing a dropoff location – the site doesn’t let him use the arrow keys on the keyboard to leave the dropdown box and move on to the next question, he showed The Land. That prevents him from completing the rest of the steps in the process of scheduling a ride, such as selecting a date, time, and number of additional passengers.
RTA is in the beta testing phase of revamping its main website, riderta.com, which is separate from the paratransit ride scheduling site. The transit agency recently released a preview of the new site to the public and is seeking user feedback. Though Rodriguez said he does not use RTA’s main website very much – he primarily uses the transit app Moovit to track routes – he has also been advocating for accessibility improvements to that site.
Rodriguez and other RTA riders have been pushing for the transit authority to make its paratransit ride scheduling site, as well as its main website, more accessible for people with disabilities. But a vendor provides the software for the paratransit ride scheduling site to RTA, and improvements to that site are on hold until 2024.
“We’re always last for everything,” Rodriguez said, referring to the way he sees the needs of people with disabilities often treated as an afterthought. “It’s always been that way: that we should be first, but no, we’re always last.”
Riders speak out about web accessibility
The morning of the day she was stranded at City Hall when her paratransit ride didn’t come to pick her up, Shalida Dobbins, vice chair of the transit advocacy group Clevelanders for Public Transit (CPT), made a public comment at the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority (RTA)’s Jan. 31 board meeting, saying that the website for scheduling paratransit rides is outdated and not accessible. She said that she spoke with another paratransit rider who refuses to use the scheduling website because of this and has missed doctor’s appointments as a result.
The paratransit ride scheduling website’s color, text, and navigation (which requires the use of a mouse) make it inaccessible for people with visual impairments and mobility issues, Dobbins said.
She submitted the website to the Bureau of Internet Accessibility (BOIA), which reviews and rates websites according to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). The ride scheduling website failed 10 of the 29 checkpoints that the BOIA tested.
Examples of failed checkpoints included in the BOIA analysis include the site’s use of color, text size, and keyboard use. Under the guidelines, users should be able to adjust text size up to 200% without losing content, and color shouldn’t be the only way information is conveyed. Users should also be able to navigate a site using only a keyboard, the guidelines say. The paratransit website requires visitors to navigate the page with a mouse, which can make it not possible for people with mobility issues or visual impairments (like Larry Rodriguez) to use.
As Rodriguez showed The Land, Dobbins said the website is not compatible with screen readers that read text to people with visual impairments. She also said the site does not display correctly on mobile devices. She would like to see the website updated by the end of 2023, she said at the meeting.
Changes to the paratransit ride scheduling website on hold until 2024
The website used for scheduling paratransit rides, paratransit.gcrta.org, is software that a vendor, Trapeze, provides to RTA. It’s separate from RTA’s main website, riderta.com, which includes routes and schedules and information about the transit authority.
RTA learned in early 2022 that the paratransit ride scheduling site was not accessible for riders who are blind or have visual impairments from the ADA subcommittee of the transit authority’s Community Advisory Committee (CAC), a group of community members who meet monthly to recommend ways RTA can improve its services, RTA’s paratransit district director Nick Davidson said.
For the paratransit ride scheduling site (paratransit.gcrta.org), Davidson said that RTA reached out to the vendor about screen reader compatibility. The vendor has upgraded the software, and the new version of the scheduling platform is expected to be available to RTA paratransit riders in 2024, Davidson said.
“The new scheduling solution will offer that screen reader compatibility. RTA does have that on its docket to upgrade. We have a couple of projects we have to complete before then, but it is slated for 2024,” Davidson said. As of Friday morning, RTA had not provided answers to inquiries from The Land about why the vendor upgrade will not be available to RTA riders until 2024 and whether RTA or Trapeze had set that timeline.
RTA relying on a third-party vendor for the paratransit ride scheduling site has created frustration for the riders advocating for changes to the site.
“If @GCRTA is going to hire outside vendors they have the responsibility to make sure those vendors are competent in their job. You can’t just can’t say it’s out of your hands,” CPT tweeted on Thursday about the situation.
Trapeze did not respond to requests for comment.
Confusion about two RTA sites; RTA also updating its main website
RTA is in the process of revamping its website (riderta.com). The transit authority recently released a preview of its new website and is seeking user feedback. It does not have a date set yet for its official launch, RTA told The Land.
In response to Dobbins’ public comment about the paratransit scheduling website at the Jan. 31 meeting, RTA general manager and CEO India Birdsong Terry said that the transit authority is in the beta testing phase of revamping the website. She seemed to confuse Dobbins’ concerns about the paratransit ride scheduling website (paratransit.gcrta.org) as referring to RTA’s website (riderta.com). Dobbins confirmed to The Land that her public comment was about the paratransit ride scheduling website (paratransit.gcrta.org).
“I would expect that we’ll make sure that we address a lot of the issues you mentioned as well. And I can say that I’m very pleased with what I’ve seen so far, but we’ll make sure that we route that and vet that before we unveil it to the public,” Birdsong Terry said at the Jan. 31 meeting.
At the Feb. 28 RTA board meeting, a community member named Sean Freeman referenced the public comment Dobbins made at the previous meeting. In his public comment, he urged RTA to respond to an email Dobbins sent to RTA asking for updates to the scheduling site. He also recommended that the board set up a meeting with the people that run the paratransit service, drivers, and paratransit riders to improve paratransit service overall.
Referring to RTA’s main website, Birdsong Terry said that RTA had planned to share some more information about the riderta.com update at the February meeting but decided to hold off for another 30 days for an additional Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) review.
On March 9, Rodriguez and Dobbins met with RTA and its web team about RTA’s main site. The web team shared a list of accessibility improvements made to the site, including updating the font size and type and color contrast. The website also has full keyboard navigation throughout, the list reads. The team tested the new website on webaccessibility.com, where it received a score of 100%, and with an accessibility tool called WAVE, which reported 0 errors and 0 contrast errors, according to the web team’s list.
During that meeting, Rodriguez used his computer to test out the new site and point out issues he came across in person to the web team.
Meanwhile, accessibility updates to the paratransit scheduling site – which affect Rodriguez more directly than RTA’s main website – are still on hold until 2024, says RTA.
Click here to give feedback on the preview of RTA’s new website. You can watch the recordings and access the minutes and presentations from the Jan. 31 board meeting, and Feb. 28 board meeting by clicking the corresponding date on this page. The transit authority holds board meetings at 9 a.m. on the third Tuesday of every month at 1240 W. 6th St. You can make a two-minute public comment at the board meetings in person or by calling 440-276-4600 during the public comment portion of the meeting. You can provide feedback to RTA by filling out this form or calling the RTA Community Connection Line. The Community Advisory Committee is currently seeking applications for new members. You can learn about the eligibility requirements and apply here.
To learn more about web accessibility, check out this list of resources from front-end web developer, web accessibility advocate, and Missouri School of Journalism adjunct instructor Patrick Garvin.
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