This document discusses accessibility of public transportation for people with mobility impairments. It finds that while structural accessibility has improved with features like ramps and priority seating on buses and in policies, there are still behavioral barriers like drivers not waiting for passengers or other passengers obstructing space. Observations of buses in Dundee found most had structural accessibility features but some drivers' behaviors could be barriers. Discussions with accessible and inaccessible taxi drivers revealed differing views on accessibility requirements. The findings suggest both structural accessibility and addressing behaviors that limit participation must be considered to improve transportation access.

1. Community Participation:
Accessibility of Public Transportation for
People with Mobility Impairments
Lia Poeder OTD/S
December 17, 2013

2. Personal Background
• Who I am
• My interests

3. Why care about participation?
• Participation in meaningful activities and
meaningful roles is correlated to quality of
life and well being (Christiansen et. al.
2005)

4. UN Convention on the Rights
of Persons with Disabilities
(CRPD)
• Demands equality for all people
regardless of ability
• Calls for adaptations to empower disabled
people to actively participate in life
ensuring all human rights are met
• Aims to decrease discrimination
United Nations, 2006

5. Traditional vs Modern
View of Disability

6. Person-Environment Interaction
Model 1
• Social Model of Disability (Hughes and
Paterson, 2013)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzRQOfVvVh4

7. Person-Environment Interaction
Model 2

11. Policy
Culture
Physical Environment
OCCUPATION
AND
ROLES
Social Support
Assistive Technology
Social Capital
Personal
Factors
Physical Activity

12. Public Transportation and
Disability
• Traditional view of disability applied to
public transportation
• Modern view of disability applied to public
transportation

13. Public Transportation
• Designed to give community access to all
of the public
• Decreased accessibility of public
transportation has been found to lead to
decreased participation (Hammel et al.,
2006)

14. Application to Dundee?
• 40% of households report no vehicle
• 20% population with disabilities
• 1/6 population over the age of 65
Scotland Census 2011

15. Dundee Resident Comments
I don’t know what I
would do without public
transportation.. I don’t
have a car so I use it for
everything..
I have seen the lifted
morale of older adults
when provided access to
the community through
transportation…
I dread using the bus…
his chair is too big, there
is no space, and people
don’t move to make
room…

16. Public Transportation
Accessibility Components
• Physical environment
• Social environment

17. Policy
• Disability
Discrimination Act
(DDA)
– Structural guidelines
for public spaces
including public
transportation
– Addresses new
construction and
remodeling

18. Literature and Public
Transportation
• Accessibility in terms of location of bus stops
• Accessibility in terms of impact on
participation
• Accessibility in terms of structural barriers

19. Aims
• What social behaviors are typical of public
transportation?
• What structural barriers and facilitators are
present on public transportation?
– How well have DDA standards been
implemented?
– How have they been implemented differently in
different areas?

20. Design
• Exploratory study
• Unobtrusive structured and unstructured
observation

21. Sampling
• Two national bus companies
– 15 buses from each company
– Routes/Times
– Types of Buses
• Bus Stops in and outside of city centre
• Dundee Taxis

22. Data Collection
• 2 weeks of bus data collection
– Unstructured Observation
• Four buses/bus stops assessed
structurally
– Bus Usability Checklist
• Taxis: 2 accessible, 2 inaccessible
– Informant Conversations

23. Structural Findings:
Bus Stops in City Centre
 Shelter
 Seating
 Signage/route
info
 Phone number for
further info

24. Structural Findings:
Bus Stops Outside City Centre
X Shelter
X Seating
X Signage/route
info
X Phone number for
further info

25. Structural Findings:
Buses
Step free entrance
36” wide entrance
Accessible seating options
Grab bar near accessible
seating
Stop alerts can be accessed
seated with closed fist

26. Behavioral Findings
• Bus Drivers
• Attendants
• Passengers

27. Bus Driver Behaviors
• Waiting for passengers to be seated
for all passengers to be seated: 1
• Use Waitshydraulics/ramp
of
Waits for passengers with visible mobility impairments to be
•seated: 527/30to the curbwith hydraulics
Pulling buses equipped
• Giving adequate pull to curb be passengers to exit
time within 6 inches
Hydraulics used passengers for seated: 24
Does not wait forinconsistentlyto
Most bus drivers did
1 ramp used
2 buses did not pull into bus lane
Add bus driver pic here

28. Bus Attendant Behaviors
• 13 buses used bus attendants
– Help passengers move through bus
– Collect money at seats
– Help passengers off of bus
– Answer questions

29. Passenger Behaviors
• Priority seating
• Passengers helping other passengers
• Passengers Obstructing Space

30. Current Taxi Policy
• All new taxis must be accessible
• Taxis that are not accessible may only pick up
passengers by appointment
• Accessible taxis must provide maintenance to
their vehicles to ensure accessibility

31. Taxi Conversations:
Accessible Taxis
• Views
– All taxis should be accessible
– There is not a larger expense to having an
accessible taxi
– It does not take more than 2 minutes of extra
time
– People do need and use the service

32. Taxi Conversations:
Inaccessible Taxis
• Views
– There is no desire/motivation to acquire an
accessible taxi
• There is no loss of money by not being able to drive
disabled people
– There are too many accessible taxis
• Some disabled people request a saloon car because of
the easy entry

33. Discussion of Findings
• Importance of both structural and behavioral
facilitators for public transportation use
• Importance of decreasing behaviors that
cause barriers to participation

34. Limitations
• Only could observe people with visible
mobility impairments
• Could not interact with anyone being
observed
• Unstructured

35. Future Research
• Further information on the impact of
behaviors on passengers
– Interviews with disabled passengers
– Assessment of those without visible impairments
• Development of more structured observations
• Assessment of other modes of public
transportation
• Assessments of interventions for behavioral
barriers

36. Questions?