[MR] handicapped services and changes in chirurgeoning for next pennsic

[Roy B. Scherer]

[Sorry if this is a duplicate; cybergremlins seem to have eaten 
earlier transmission.]

At 04:59 AM 8/20/2007 -0700, beth roberts wrote:
>This year anyone who uses handicapped transportation
>will tell you it was a mess at Pennsic this year.
>First of all the normal 4-6 golf carts brought in for
>use by handicapped services was reduced to one, yep
>just one for all of Pennsic. Secondly, since there was
>only one cart, they also did away with dispatch for
>handicapped services and routed all requests through
>the regular dispatch that fields all the regular
>calls.

Milady Gwynwilf (and others in the Tavern) --

I cannot speak to the reasons for the change this year, nor
to the issue of transporting fighters' armor, but I may be able
to add something on cart useage, as I spent eight or ten
shifts working Dispatch at Public Safety this Pennsic.

First of all, the system semed to me to be unneccesarily
complicated.  Althoug there was a Mobility Assistance base
station somewhere, they did not dispatch the cart directly.
Instead, they had to call Public Safety base and ask for us to
send the cart.  This strikes me as inefficient in the extreme.

Second of all, the cart in question was a four-seater, and I
don't recall there ever being more than one person assigned to
it.  It was almost always driver-only, no shotgun.  That means
that the cart could carry as many as three passengers, which
with just a lttle bit of juggling meant that the number of individual
trips could be reduced greatly.

Lastly, there were long stretches of time when the service was
not required at all.  I'm not aware of the reason for this, since at a
previous Pennsic I served as a driver for one of the three (???)
Mobility Assist carts, and that year there was very little down
time.  Nonetheless, it was quite common this year for more than
an hour to go by with no requests for Mobility Assist.

I hope that this information may be useful.

--YIS,
-- Britton Morgan


end

		- - Roy B. Scherer
  [8 N. Sheppard Street, Richmond, VA 23221; (804) 355-7612]
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