Queensland Train Manufacturing Program

Co-design as a concept is very sound, it identifies issues before they become issues.

This particular co-design process has been one of the better ones, if not the best I've been involved with.

So I'm more than pleased that we've been heard, our recommendations have been acted upon and wherever practicable changes are being made.

Just talking on behalf of people who because of what they're living with, they withdraw from society.

So these are not people that we take much notice of traditionally.

So for me to be able to bring that perspective and to be able to say this is what this person is experiencing when they look at public transport, what's making it accessible for people who have social anxiety?

There's little tiny pockets of space where we can feel more private and more contained and more in control of your environment.

And that's really clever design.

Being able to enter the service where it's completely level allows me to be able to access the facility independently.

If people aren't able to use a particular good or a service, they'll stay home and isolate, which is dangerous.

It's not healthy for people as individuals and it's not good for the community.

50% of people with disability don't currently work for a variety of reasons, and transport's one of them.

So the more people that have employment, the more things they want to do in the community.

Everybody wins from this.

The train builders have never gone through a co-design process before.

They are taking note of what the customer experiences are in the way that they're dealing with the proposed design and understanding why part of that design perhaps doesn't quite work as well as it could or should.

We have train builders on the one hand and you've got the project team from the Department of Transport and then you have the customer group that are working together respectfully and very well, exceptionally well.

Best things are worked out at 1:1 scale, which is to say you come and look at it, feel it, and you find out what does and doesn't work.

What looks good on paper might not work in practise.I have really enjoyed seeing the physical representation and it has made a difference to walk through it and to be able to touch things and to sit and, and to bring a representative, you know, someone with lived experience to, to be able to do that as well was really valuable.

And then to hear them walk away and say I can't wait to get on that train.

And I think we, we, we're doing something good here.

We do have an exceptionally good toilet module with a left and a right-hand transfer option.

I don't know of any other train that offers that.

And that was based on feedback from our group.

So if people hop on this train, no matter who they are, and find that it's a comfortable and enjoyable experience to actually catch the train, I would hope they'd get on and not notice anything because it was so convenient that they didn't have to think.

I don't like that.

That would be my best outcome.

Watching their response to saying people thought about us when they designed this train, I think it's a bigger message.

It is great for the trains, it's really valuable for Brisbane and for Australia and for our public transport systems.

But it's also a bigger message to the wider community that who you are and how you live and what's important to you matters.