Universal Transportation: From Specialist Provision to Entitlement and Inclusion ~ Evolving Transport Policies and the Provision of Accessible Transport

This paper explores the evolving approaches to transport policy in the United Kingdom (UK), from the perspective of the provision of accessible transport facilities for elderly and disabled people, especially at a local level in the main urban areas outside London. It considers the three main categories of formal help with mobility: financial assistance; adapting main-stream transport facilities to make them more easily usable by elderly and disabled people; and specialist transport services provided for particular groups of users. It is concluded that policy has evolved from one focusing on ‘specialist transport services’ to meet particular ‘special needs’, to one of ‘inclusive transport provision’ within which the transport problems of elderly and disabled people are beginning to be subsumed within wider issues of ‘social inclusion’ and the more general problems of those within society who are without access to private cars and so are dependant on public transport. Comments are made regarding the likely implications of this for the impact of local transport policies on the particular needs of elderly and disabled people.