Transport Focus and accessibility

02 May 2018

Transport Focus supports work to improve accessibility on rail, bus, coach, and tram, and across the Strategic Road Network.  We ensure that the views of transport users help drive positive change.

Some of our activity in this area has included:

  • Conducting research to understand how the Covid 19 pandemic has impacted the experience and attitudes of disabled transport users. It looked at the impact of disability on work and other opportunities, the differing perceptions of safety and views on assistance lanyards schemes used to discreetly inform people that the wearer needs a bit more support or time.
  • Checking in detail the draft Accessible Travel Policies (ATPS) for newly licenced rail operators or those with new franchise awards and suggesting improvements where appropriate. We also review ATPS where there has been a substantive change to existing policies that impact the assistance provided to passengers.
  • Encouraging all operators to adopt best practice and suggesting enhancements to existing guidance issued by industry bodies such as the Rail Safety Standards Board.
  • Meeting transport providers and industry bodies to discuss accessibility matters.
  • Researching the design of new trains and gaining passengers’ views.

Our research

In our regular tracker surveys on train, bus and tram we ask passengers whether they are affected by any physical or mental health conditions or illness lasting or expected to last more than 12 months. This enables us to draw extra details from the data to inform us of the experience of disabled passengers using the transport network. In our other research projects, we try and ensure the views of disabled transport users are captured and analysed. Where there are significant differences, for example, in satisfaction, between disabled and non-disabled transport users we will highlight this when reporting the results.

 

Data for each of our tracker surveys is available on our website here and can be split by disabled and non-disabled to show any differences in experience.