Accessibility,mobility and transport-related social exclusion

This paper briefly reviews the inexorable rise of the social exclusion policy paradigm and uses an adaptation of Amartya Sen’s theory of entitlement to determine appropriate policy responses. In particular, the promotion by the UK Department for Transport of accessibility planning is examined. Although this initiative is not totally without merit, the resulting analysis may be too aggregate, both spatially and socially. The weakness of such an approach is that transport-related social exclusion is not always a socially and spatially concentrated process. Instead we suggest a matrix of area accessibility, area mobility and individual mobility as a possible schema for identifying concentrated and scattered manifestations of social exclusion and inclusion and for suggesting appropriate policy responses. This schema helps produce a more spatially and socially differentiated conceptualisation of social exclusion, helps identify policy responses and most critically highlights that the problems of the socially excluded immobile should not be analysed in isolation from the socially included mobile.     

Transport and social exclusion in London

Few studies explicitly link transport and social exclusion and yet there is increasing pressure from policy-makers in the UK to do so. We propose a conceptual framework which links the two and examine a selection of indicators which might be used in assessing the outcomes of policies designed to use increased mobility to reduce exclusion. An illustrative example of the use of London Transport's CAPITAL model is demonstrated to assess access to regeneration sites. We conclude that increasing access to activities and services requires combating individuals’ constraints at either end of their journey in addition to transport system improvements.     

Transport and social exclusion: access to higher education in the UK policy context

This paper examines the student experience of transport, within the context of two hitherto distinct discourses. Firstly, the transport and social exclusion discourse, which highlights the role that low mobility plays in the experience of exclusion. Secondly, the widening participation discourse, which emphasises inequitable access to and achievement in higher education (HE) by non-traditional students as a component of social exclusion. The paper reports the results of a series of focus groups, undertaken with current HE students from a diverse range of backgrounds, many of whom may be considered to be non-traditional students. Results suggest that inadequate access to transport is a substantial barrier to access and achievement in HE, for these students. This highlights the influence of transport upon the successful implementation of social policy. Without consideration of transport and the physical accessibility of HE, the aim of increasing and widening participation in HE is unlikely to be realised.     

The usefulness of social exclusion to inform social policy in transport

This article examines a variety of conceptualisations and measurement approaches to social exclusion and the usefulness of these to understanding social policy as it relates to transport. It argues that there is a need to broaden the criteria to encompass all aspects of well-being, the broad outcome desired to optimise a person's mobility. Understanding of the importance of interpersonal interactions is not well covered under the ambit of social exclusion, thus the need for measures around social capital and community. Additionally, there is a need to include measures of psychological factors, to comprehensively understand transport outcomes for people.     

Transport practice and policy in Mauritius

Like many developing nations over the last twenty years or so, the small, isolated, densely populated, developing Indian Ocean island of Mauritius has undergone––and continues to undergo––a revolution in the way its society lives and works. From a transport perspective, the case of Mauritius is interesting because it exhibits many of the transport problems faced in other countries, such as worsening congestion, air pollution and traffic accidents, but its transport planners have rather less time, experience and resources to develop a solution before the situation becomes critical, due to the faster pace of population, economic growth, and the lack of space. Further, while Mauritius is clearly a developing country, the future policy options currently being considered by the Government are perhaps better suited to a western developed nation than to a less capital intensive country.This paper outlines the development of transport policy on the island to date, and suggests that Mauritius might look to models closer to home to see how to address its problems instead of looking to the West for its inspiration.     

Transport and rural development in Nigeria

This paper examines the road transport programmes of Nigeria's Directorate of Foods, Roads and Rural Infrastructure (DFRRI) in terms of its expectations and achievements since its inception in 1986 and their general effects on rural development. The analysis shows that, although the Directorate has achieved about 55% of its targeted road programmes, wide variations exist among the states, ranging from 14% to 79%. Nevertheless the construction and/or rehabilitation of about 61 000 kilometres of roads since 1986 has stepped up the production capacity of Nigerian farmers and has opened up several agricultural lands and increased overall accessibility in the country.     

Transport policy and environmental impacts: The importance of multi-instrumentality in policy integration

Despite the introduction of many instruments in the transport system, they failed to reach their target since gains in global environmental efficiency have not been enough to cope with the consequences of transport growth. The ultimate environmental challenge for transport policy makers is to improve the effectiveness of implementation of policy instruments. This paper explores the concept of multi-instrumentality as a systematic approach for transport policy integration and implementation. Based on extensive literature review, we assess a set of 14 transport policy instruments (weaknesses, strengths and barriers to implementation) and perform a pair-wise analysis of potential synergies in their integrated implementation. Conclusions are drawn on the potential success of multi-instrumentality.     

Activity spaces: measures of social exclusion?

The paper provides a first investigation of the suitability of different measures of activity space size to identify persons at risk of social exclusion. This would be a new departure for the measurement of social exclusion, which so far has relied either on aggregate measures of locations or cross-sectional data of individuals.The size of a person's activity space can only be estimated with information reflecting a longer time horizon. In this paper the six-week travel diary survey (Mobidrive) is used, which was conducted in two German cities in 1999. About 95% of all local trips were coded for 300 respondents (about 45,000 trips).The paper develops three possible measurement approaches of increasing complexity (confidence ellipse, kernel density estimates, shortest paths networks). The analysis revealed that the main driver of the size of the activity spaces is the overall number of unique locations visited by the respondents and to a lesser extent, their socio-demographic characteristics. In particular, the groups most often consider to be at risk of social exclusion (female, lower income, elderly) did not show significantly different activity spaces.     

The spatial context of transport disadvantage, social exclusion and well-being

Equity has been a major concern of public transport provision and is required by legislation in many countries. Several approaches measure equity in transit supply however none produce a simple system-wide measure of equity performance. A new approach is presented using Lorenz curves to measure the relative supply of transit to the population. Gini coefficients provide a single measure of overall equity using this method. A system-wide assessment of overall transit supply to the population in Melbourne, Australia shows that 70% of the population shares only 19% of the supply (Gini coefficient = .68). When employment is also taken into account, the situation is not much different; 70% of jobs and population share 23% of service (G = .62). In order to gain some understanding of vertical equity, the transit supply was compared between different age, income and vehicle ownership groups. There is some evidence of higher supply for youth and low-income groups in inner Melbourne, and in all parts of Melbourne no-vehicle households lived in areas of higher transit supply. Overall it is unclear how “fair” these distributions are compared to equity in other cities since this is the first time this method has been undertaken. Projects using similar approaches should provide a good basis for establishing comparative equity between cities.     

Dynamics of transport and social exclusion: Effects of expensive driver's license

This study explores the interface between the theme of “transport-related social exclusion” and resource allocation in a household. The study posits the “license to drive” as a skill which affects the family as a whole. The consequences of expensive driver's license (DL) within the domain of family structure, gender and its implications for the non-western immigrants in Norway are discussed. Further we analyse how decision-making within a family and the tenets of social exclusion are therefore affected both by the availability of public transport and price of procuring a driving license in the Norwegian context. Through assessing the linkages between expensive driver's license and its substitution elasticity by public transport, we arrive at a surprising possibility that for high values on both factors, an additional increase to the substitution elasticity (improved public transport) may lead to further social exclusion for certain groups through a denied access to driver's license.     

Exploring the relative influences of transport disadvantage and social exclusion on well-being

This paper explores the separate and combined effects of transport disadvantage and social exclusion on well-being using an empirical analysis of data from a travel and disadvantage survey in Victoria, Australia. Previous research explores the impact of transport on social exclusion but does not study the downstream impacts on well-being. To explore this relationship measures of subjective well-being are compared across four groups: (i) people who are neither transport disadvantaged nor socially excluded, (ii) transport disadvantaged only, (iii) socially excluded only and (iv) both transport disadvantaged and socially excluded. The paper explores which component aspects of social exclusion and transport disadvantage have the greatest impact on well-being and which social groups are most likely to face transport disadvantage and social exclusion together. The paper concludes with a commentary on how the findings might be used to better target policy interventions meant to improve well-being.     

Mobilities of the periphery: Informality,access and social exclusion in the urban fringe in Colombia

The relationship between transport, poverty and social exclusion has increasingly held an important place in both research and policy agendas, particularly in industrialised countries. While this has helped consolidate an emerging body of theory concerned with the social consequences of mobility, our understanding of these dynamics in the context of high vulnerability and poverty in the Global South is still relatively undeveloped. Through the case of Soacha, a municipality adjacent to Colombia's capital, Bogotá, this paper explores travel strategies in a context of scarce provision of transport which, when combined with acute conditions of low-income and segregation, limit vulnerable populations' access to the city. The travel practices, perceptions and priorities of low-income populations in deprived areas of the Global South are analysed, using a framework of transport-related social exclusion, to critically examine the elements that play a role in gaining access to the city. The emergence of adaptable methods, relations and transactions between demand and supply that allows deprived populations to reduce their risk of becoming socially excluded show potential for conceptual and practical development in addressing and analysing transport-related social exclusion.     

Transport policy in Dutch election manifestos: Estimating the environmental impact

It has become a tradition in the Netherlands to assess the environmental impact of election manifestos produced by Dutch political parties. This paper shows that the assessment methodology chosen for transport policy proposals can lead to uncertain estimates. However, election manifesto transport analysis can meritably establish which election manifesto offers the most—and which the least—environmental impact, a robust result that does not mislead the public. The pros and cons of assessing election manifestos have been fiercely debated in the Netherlands. Following this debate and our own observations we conclude that another important merit of assessment is that it can assist political parties in making their election promises realistic and consistent.     

Transport problems that matter - social and psychological links to transport disadvantage

This paper presents an analysis exploring self-reported measures of transport disadvantage and how these relate to social exclusion and well-being in Melbourne, Australia. A sample of 535 individuals sourced from a household survey explores ratings of 18 types of transport problems. The questionnaire also measured social exclusion represented in five dimensions including income, unemployment, political engagement, participation in activities and social support networks. Well-being was also measured adopting standard psychological measures of ‘Satisfaction with Life’, ‘Personal Well-being Index,’ ‘Positive Affect’ and ‘Negative Affect’.A factor analysis of self-reported transport difficulties identified four statistically significant sub-scales (‘transport disadvantage’, ‘transit disadvantage’, ‘Vulnerable/Impaired’ and ‘rely on others’) which together account for 57% of the variance in the responses.Analysis established that those with high self-reported transport problems were more likely to be located in fringe and remote parts of the city and lived in areas where it was not possible to walk to a local shop. However all groups made an average number of trips per day (except the ‘Vulnerable/Impaired’ group which make fewer trips) suggesting that self-reported transport disadvantage is unrelated to realised mobility. Analysis further established that only the ‘Vulnerable/Impaired’ group was associated with social exclusion and that they also had the lowest values of well-being compared to other groups.Overall findings confirm the methodological concerns associated with the use of self-reported measures of transport problems as a basis for defining transport disadvantage. The majority of those with high self-reported transport problems did not travel less than the survey sample as a whole and they were not associated with social exclusion. However the ‘Vulnerable/Impaired’ group was the exception, displaying a significantly higher association with social exclusion and lower well-being.The findings suggest which aspects of transport disadvantage are likely to be of greater concern for social policy. A concentration of research and policy on issues and social groups associated with the ‘Vulnerable/Impaired’ factor would be more effective in reducing social exclusion. Transport problems associated with this group including physical access to transport, knowing where to go and feeling safe from theft or attack when travelling may deserve higher priorities for attention. In addition those associated with the ‘Vulnerable/Impaired’ factor including older retired females and those who are more likely to be looking after someone with an illness or disability are clearly a high risk group and should warrant positive discrimination in transport and social policy.     

The impact of transport on social exclusion processes with specific emphasis on road user charging

This paper looks at the ways in which transport can impact on social exclusion processes by examining how the introduction of road user charging may affect residents of Bristol. It gives an overview of the concept of transport and social inclusion/exclusion, describes key themes emerging from DfT-funded research conducted in the city and reflects on the importance of consideration of these themes to the policy's successful implementation. By exploring road user charging from both collective and individual perspectives, the paper illustrates how this congestion charging policy could promote social inclusion.     

Designing optimal urban transport strategies: The role of individual policy instruments and the impact of financial constraints

This paper presents a methodology for the design of optimal transport strategies and the case study results of the methodology for the City of Edinburgh, using the two multi-modal transport/land-use models MARS and TPM. First, a range of policy instruments are optimised in turn and their relative impacts explored. Second, optimisations with and without financial constraints are performed and compared. Although both models produce similar optimal policies, the relative contribution of the instruments differs between models as does the impact on outcome indicators. It is also shown that by careful design it is possible to identify a strategy which costs no more than the do-minimum but which can generate substantial additional benefits. The optimisation methodology is found to be robust, and is able to be used with different transport models, and with and without financial constraints.     

Making the connections between transport disadvantage and the social exclusion of low income populations in the Tshwane Region of South Africa

To date, the majority of studies which consider transport from a social exclusion perspective have been conducted in the context of the developed world where both income poverty and lack of transport are relative rather absolute states. In a unique departure from these previous studies, this paper explores the relationship between transport and social disadvantage in the development context, the key difference being that income poverty is absolute and where there is much lower access to both private and public transportation generally. Thus, it seeks to explore whether the concept of social exclusion remains valid, when it is the majority of the population that is experiencing transport and income poverty compared with the minority who do so in advanced economies.The paper is based on a scoping study for the Republic of South Africa Department of Transport (RSA DOT), which primarily involved focus group discussions with a range of socially deprived urban and peri-urban population groups living in the Tshwane region of South Africa. In a second departure from previous studies which consider transport and social disadvantage in the development context, the study takes a primarily urban focus. The rationale for this is that theoretically low income urban settlements do not suffer from the lack of transport infrastructure and motorised transport services in the way that more remote rural areas do. The policy issue is therefore less a question of addressing a deficit in supply and more one of addressing particular aspects of public transit service failure, which are more readily amenable to relatively low cost, manageable, small-scale national and local policy interventions.A primary aim for the study was to reinvigorate cross-government debate of these issues in the hope of breaking South African government’s long-standing and persistent policy inertia in the delivery of equitable and socially sustainable urban transport systems.