Help shape the future of accessible rail travel
Sight Loss Councils (SLC) and Greater Thameslink Railway (GTR) invite blind and partially sighted people to help shape the future of accessible rail travel.
Over the last two years, SLC volunteers from the South East, London, and East England, all with lived experience of sight loss, have helped create a series of station and train audio guides to support more confident and independent journeys.
The guides help passengers familiarise themselves with station layouts, key facilities, navigation points, and train interiors before they travel.
We are seeking feedback to understand the impact of these resources, identify opportunities for improvement, and inform future accessibility developments across the rail network.
Whether you’ve used the guides yourself, heard about them from someone else, or are discovering them for the first time, your feedback will help us understand their impact and identify opportunities for future improvements.
We’d love to hear from you.
SLC volunteers and staff at London Blackfriars during the creation of the audio guide
Why your feedback matters
Your feedback will help us:
- Understand how useful the guides are for blind and partially sighted passengers
- Identify opportunities to improve existing guides
- Explore whether audio guides should be developed for additional stations
- Improve awareness of the accessible rail travel resources available
- Demonstrate the impact of guides developed with lived experience
Every response helps us build a clearer picture of what makes rail travel more accessible.
Station Audio Guides
Listen to audio guides for the following stations:
Onboard Train Audio Guides
Our onboard train guides help passengers understand train layouts before travelling, including details about:
- entrances and exits
- seating areas
- priority seating
- toilets
- luggage storage
- key onboard features
Available train guides include:
- Thameslink Class 700 audio
- Southern Class 171 audio
- Southern Class 377 audio
- Great Northern Class 717 audio
Written versions of these guides can be found on Thameslink’s Support while travelling page.
After exploring the guides, please take a few minutes to share your feedback.
Complete the survey
We’d love to hear your feedback on our station and train audio guides.
Your experiences and insights will help us understand the impact these resources are having for blind and partially sighted passengers, identify opportunities for improvement, and support the future development of accessible travel information across the rail network.
The survey should only take a few minutes to complete.
Lauren, SLC Coordinator for South East England, steps off a Southern train during project work
We are grateful to ElevenLabs for supporting the development of our station and train audio guides. Their support has helped us make these resources available to blind and partially sighted rail passengers.
Learn more about the project
Read how Sight Loss Councils and Greater Thameslink Railway (GTR) have been working together to improve rail accessibility for blind and partially sighted passengers through station and train audio guides, accessibility assessments and community engagement activities
Join us
Passionate about making a difference? Want to influence positive change? Our Sight Loss Councils, led by blind and partially sighted volunteers, are recruiting new members. Join us today!
We use our lived experience to create positive change for others. Together, we tackle local issues and work with businesses and service providers to improve the accessibility of their services.
Join us to help ensure visually impaired people in your area can live the lives they want to lead.
Publication date: 25 September 2026