Metro News Release

For immediate release: December 29, 2005

Video educates public on improving the ride for service dogs on Metro

"Metro Madness: Riding the Metro through a Service Dog’s Perspective," a video now available on Metro’s Web site, offers tips for Metro riders on proper etiquette toward service animals that assist people with disabilities.

Disabled riders who have service animals ride the system everyday. During the peak period and when the system gets crowded, the dogs often get pushed aside or stepped on by other commuters.

"Metro Madness: Riding the Metro through a Service Dog’s Perspective," a three-minute and 20-second video, tells the story of riding Metro from the eyes of Zadia, a leader dog. In the video, Zadia travels with Barbara Thomas, a visually- impaired rider who worked as an intern with the Department of Veterans Affairs. Throughout the commute, a customer bumps Zadia’s head with his bag, several customers push her aside to get onto a train ahead of her, another customer steps on her tail and then pets her. Zadia simply asks her fellow riders to be considerate and give her room to do her job.

Simple tips a customer can follow to improve the ride for service animals include raising their bags when passing leader dogs on an escalator so that the bags don’t hit the dogs, allowing the dogs and their companions to board first instead of pushing them to the side and not petting the animals.

The video was produced by the Veterans Administration to educate the public on the difficulties of commuting for service animals and their companions.

Viewers can watch "Metro Madness: Riding the Metro through a Service Dog’s Perspective," on Metro’s Web site by clicking on the "How to travel" link, then the "Commuting tips" link. Or they can go to http://www.wmata.com/riding/leader_dogs.cfm.

News release issued on December 29, 2005.