In this series of articles, I will investigate how accessible Greater Manchester is for disabled people. This article will look at the accessibility of public transport.
Transport is an essential part of Manchester as its streets are filled with hundreds of yellow buses and trams daily thanks to the Bee Network, created by Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham. However, over the past five years the Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) received a total of 87 public complaints about the inaccessibility of both buses and trams for wheelchair users.
To combat this, in November 2024, Greater Manchester signed up to the national Accessible Transport Charter which led to the appointment of their first ever disability representative, Labour Cllr Tracey Rawlins.
So what has changed since the Bee Network introduced a disability representative?
Buses
A total of 45 complaints were made about wheelchair accessibility of buses according to TfGM from 2019 to 2024, with the highest number of complaints at 19 made in 2024.
From my own survey, one participant from Stockport said: “Some buses don’t recognise SEN pushchairs as being equal priority to a wheelchair.”
Victoria Ellen often feels under pressure when travelling on the bus as a disabled person, she said: “I have a disabled bus pass for Greater Manchester and that works on most of the trams, trains and buses. Because I do use public transport a lot, I find that sometimes the bus drivers and passengers can be a bit funny about it.
“I sometimes sit at the front of the bus, but people look at me funny sometimes because I’ve got an invisible disability. I do have a walking stick because I’ve got really bad knees and they get really bad. It’s horrible when people give you really disapproving looks.”
Looking at other places in the UK, in 2024 alone, Transport for London received a total of 441 public complaints about wheelchair accessibility on buses, 56 due to ramp failures and 385 due to refusal to admit wheelchairs.
Mark Evers, TfL’s Chief Customer Officer, said: “The number of incidents on our buses where there has either been an unreasonable refusal to admit a wheelchair user or deploy the on-bus ramp is completely unacceptable, but is proportionately very small to the number of journeys made.
“We sincerely apologise to all customers who have had this experience and would like to reassure them that we are working closely with all bus operators to make sure every driver knows what’s expected of them, as well as introducing a new disability training course developed with a specialist provider.”
Trams
A total of 42 complaints were made about trams not being wheelchair accessible from 2019 to 2024, with the highest number of complaints being 21 made in 2024.
Despite this, Ellie Henry and Zara Beth both found the trams enabled them to get around the city with ease, but instead have issues getting onto the tram platforms.
Ellie uses the trams to get to and from Chill Factore for her ski lessons completely independently. However, the roadworks outside the Castlefield tram stop make it harder for Ellie to access the tram.
She said: “Where I am in Castlefield, they’re doing a lot of road works to turn the roads into one-way. Outside the tram stop I have to go round all three sides of the traffic lights to get across [to the lift], because they’ve only put ramps in three of [the entrances] and not that one, and that’s the one I need.”
Zara spoke out about the inaccessibility of the tram platform after she was left stranded below ground level on a platform due to a broken lift in Piccadilly Station. She posted about the issue to her TikTok and labelled the video ‘accessibility fail’, which gained 4.8 millions views.
Following her experience, she said: “I was actually meant to be having a meeting with Metrolink and I couldn’t get to the meeting because the lift was broken, which is quite ironic.
“Trams are a lot easier than buses, but lifts are the issue – so any platform where it’s outside, like Market Street, Piccadilly Gardens, all those are great and I’ve never had an issue because of the ramp. It’s the indoor stops, like the Bury stop, Piccadilly Station, they have lifts because it’s not on street level.
“It lets it down because lifts break a lot and there’s only one, so there’s not really much of an alternative.”
TfGM’s Customer and Growth Director Fran Wilkinson said: “Accessibility is one of our six customer commitments – we want everyone to be able to use the Bee Network, our integrated public transport system bringing together buses, trams and active travel.
“We take all complaints about this issue extremely seriously and always listen to feedback. We have invested in a number of measures to make it easier for people to use public transport including wheelchair spaces on all buses, hearing induction loops, audio and visual announcement systems and anti-slip flooring.
“We’re working hard to improve journeys further by making bus stops better, safer and more accessible.”
Train stations
A newer endeavour of the Bee Network is exploring the accessibility of train stations. On January 21, Andy Burnham confirmed that the Bee Network will take rail services into public control in a similar manner to the buses.
This means 96 of Greater Manchester railway stations will be served by yellow Bee Network trains by 2030.
But what does this have to do with accessibility?
Nathaniel Yates has cerebral palsy which affects the left side of his body, and in 2013 he fell down the stairs at Reddish North station and injured his knee attempting to catch his train in a rush.
Since then, he has been campaigning to make it easier for people with disabilities to access train stations. He secured funding for step free access in his local station in Reddish North, Stockport, in April 2024.
Now, the Greater Manchester Combined Authority GMCA plans include funding for his most recent campaign at Levenshulme station after they signed off £34m to improve accessibility across 10 Greater Manchester stations on January 31.
The cash will go towards installing lifts, ramps, help points, automatic doors, hearing loops, handrails, braille station maps, tactile surfaces, station toilet and waiting facility refurbishments, and more to make it easier for people with disabilities to use stations.
Nathaniel said: “It’s been a long fight because I’ve been fighting since 2018 for Reddish North and that’s getting four million pounds worth of funding now.
“Part of it was emotional because I’d been working on it for a while, part of it was excitement, part of it was just delight that everybody’s going to have these stations at some point. Just knowing that I can make a difference and it was important to actually get these changes.
“Obviously, it’d be dead exciting to see people working on these stations, it will be a personal triumph for me. But more importantly, generations after, we’ll be able to use these stations, whether you’re in a wheelchair, you’ve got a walking impairment, you’ve got a bike or you’ve got a buggy.
“Everybody should be able to use these stations and use the train.”
The 31-year-old’s campaign inspired Transport for Greater Manchester’s Access for All (AfA) Programme, which opened in December 2021, supporting his ambition to make all stations in Greater Manchester step free by 2030.
Nathaniel’s efforts even grabbed the attention of Andy Burnham, who supports his campaign and even travelled with him on public transport to gain a better perspective of the issues he was raising.
Nathaniel said: “I really try to include the community in my campaign. I’ve had meetings with Dame Sarah Storey and Baroness Grey-Thompson as well so Paralympians are even interested. And they said: what an inspirational campaign you’ve got going on – you’ve done really well.
“We’ve done well to get where we are to this point, but now we need to fight for more stations and make sure all these changes actually get implemented.”
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