Hi - please don't take this the wrong way, but I'm wondering if there has been a miscommunication somewhere (maybe internally) at Disney? Maybe someone in Transportation who misunderstood something? (Not at all dismissing what you were told and understand to be true; I don't know if you have some relationship with Disney that would make you privy to information the public doesn't have)
I'm just curious.
The reason I say that is because currently virtually *all* scooters at some point are using reverse while parking on a Disney Resort bus. Unless Disney is changing the orientation of the parking spaces on the buses (from parallel, along the length of the bus - to perpendicular - so that a seated ECV rider looking straight out the back door would see the same direction as the ramp unfolds) anyone riding an ECV will still have to back up at some point during the parking process.
If an ECV rider backs into the bus while retaining the same orientation of the current parking it doesn't really solve any problem; most ECVs will still have to turn and drive "forward" into the bus for at least a small amount of space, and then back up again into the spot. Far from saving time or effort, I believe it would actually take longer to park the average ECV rider, only because we *all* go slower in reverse than we do going forward; unlike most vehicles we drive, typically we do not have rear view mirrors and/or cameras to aid us when backing up in an ECV.
There are already transportation options at Disney World where an ECV must back out, and those are the Monorail and the Skyliner. However in both of those cases, the ECV is driven straight in, and at the destination, reverses back out of the cabin.
I'm not asking you to divulge any information that may be part of your job, or to divulge sources - I certainly don't want to get anyone in trouble. But even if the driver could do their part of securing the device in less than 30 seconds, any time saved will be more than offset by the amount of time lost by backing an ECV up the ramp, and trying to maneuver into the parking space afterward...
If the securement device is the one I found, guests would need to face rear to use it.
I am always very curious about technology solutions, so I read a lot about it. These screenshots are from QStraint (securement device manufacture) videos.
This drawing shows securement stations in both directions - front facing is the direction Disney buses currently use. There are no safe side facing positions for wheelchairs on buses.
Transit buses require both rear and front facing (if there was only one, passengers who get motion sickness facing backwards could never ride).
The screenshots from one of the videos show a city transit bus with both rear and front facing positions at the front of the bus. Since those kind of buses load everyone from the front, the rear facing position would require a lot less manouvering than the front facing one. The rear facing passenger would just need to drive past the space and back up enough to line up correctly. The front facing guy would have needed to turn completely around to get into position, but he had more space than Disney buses.
For buses with rear entry, like the Disney ones, backing up the ramp and into the bus might be difficult and time consuming, but maybe less time to manouver once in the bus. And, getting out would take less time -rear facing passengers just pull out forward to exit out the rear door. Front facing passengers need to make a full turn to drive out the back door.
So, even for Disney, the total time may be shorter.
Some of the videos show ECVs, so it is designed and safety tested for ECVs. That would be a big deal for Disney since ECVs don't really have good ways to be secured.
This last screenshot is the Quantum brochure.
CITY TRANSIT is much different than Disney buses. I rode city buses almost every day thru High School and College. People often rode the same bus at the same time every day with the same driver.
