Institute of Transport Economics (TØI) in Norway has recently completed a report describing policies, legal frameworks and other means for improving accessibility of public transport systems in EU, Iceland and Norway. The report is part of the 6th EU framework project Euro Access.

Euro Access
Eurostat (2003) has estimated that more than 45 million persons of working age, living in EU countries, have a long-term disability or medical condition. These numbers are expected to grow. Employment rates for disabled people are lower than the average, which also contributes to the fact that disabled people in average is less well off than the population as a whole.

The objective of the Euro Access project is to promote social inclusion and active participation in society of disabled people through contribution to the development of EU policy on the accessibility of public transport systems. The project has a strong focus on the link between accessibility of public transport and employment, and on transferability of best practices between countries.

Accessible public transport systems are here understood to be systems which integrate all people – including those with mobility, sensory and cognitive impairments, mental health problems, environmental sensitivities and allergies – when delivering public transport services. This includes the whole journey; to be able to understand how the public transport system works, get to and from terminals or stops, to move around and find one’s way in terminals, get on and off vehicles, buy a ticket and travel with confidence. All surface public transport is covered, local as well as long distance and international transport.

The main approach of Euro Access is to propose a framework for the transferability of good practice between EU countries, based on knowledge about current policies and legal frameworks in the countries, about the needs and expectations of people with disabilities and about best practices in the field of accessible public transport systems. The work is organised in four main work packages, as illustrated in figure 1.


Figure 1: The Euro Access approach (Euro Access 2007).

Policies, legal frameworks and other means
The TØI report briefly describes the many documents containing current policies, action plans and strategies, legal frameworks (laws, acts, provisions, regulations, guidelines etc.), and other means (concessionary fares, economic incentives, budget requirements, special transport services, strategic plans, training etc.) in the EU countries, Iceland and Norway (Tennøy and Leiren 2008). The ca. 350 references are organised as an inventory, listed by topic and country, and may be useful for others dealing with accessibility of public transport systems.

The main data source has been an extensive questionnaire to ministries responsible for public transport. Other sources, like general literature on the topic, former studies, information accessible at the internet and so on have been used for background information and for cross-check and completion of data.

Policies, strategies and action plans demonstrate countries’ will to change the status quo. Most of the countries in the survey have, or are in progress of making, policies aimed specifically at improving accessibility of public transport systems, as well as action plans to support and implement the policies. All of the main policy documents (except for one) are dated 2003 or later. There is a lot going on in this field.

Translating a will to change into a legal framework is an important means to achieve real improvements. Most of the countries have general regulatory texts on accessibility, as well as planning and building acts that incorporate the needs of disabled people to access and move around in terminals etc. Half the countries have a transport or a public transport act that recognizes accessibility for disabled people. Half of them also have regulations on accessibility of vehicles based on EU directive 2001/85/EC. Guidelines and handbooks are important parts of the legal framework.

The countries work with policies and legal frameworks for accessibility of public transport systems in various ways. They also differ in how far they have come, as presented in table 1.


Table 1: What would you say is the status of your work, regarding policies and legal frameworks for ensuring accessible public transport? The information is provided by the respondents.

Since 2000, the EU has implemented several directives and regulations aiming at making public transport systems more accessible and useful for all. This has had influence on the countries responding to our survey, as shown in table 2.

Table 2: Influence of various groups on the development of the legal framework regarding accessible public transport. The information is provided by the respondents.

There is a shift going on in the discussions regarding accessibility, from focus on disabled people and especially mobility impaired, towards universal design or accessibility for all people. Barrier free environments are understood as useful not only for disabled people, but also for e.g. parents with prams, elderly persons and people temporary dependent of crutches as well. This shift is reflected in policies and legal frameworks of the countries attending the survey, see table 3.


Table 3: Are your policies, legal framework etc. directed mainly towards universal design/design for all or mainly towards disabled people as a specific group? The information in the table is provided by the respondents.

Most countries do have a special focus on reducing transport as a barrier to work, study and independent living. Firstly, reducing transport as a barrier to education, study and independent living is expressed, explicitly or implicitly, as a general objective of policies and legal frameworks. Secondly, special transport services are organised in order to allow people who are not able to use ordinary transport services to work, study and live independent lives. Thirdly, several countries have particular projects and schemes directly focused on reducing transport as a barrier.

The Nordic countries
TØI has discussed findings from the Nordic countries in a separate report for the Norwegian Public Roads Administration (Tennøy and Hanssen 2007). Among others we found that the policies of the Nordic countries are ambitious, heading for universal design and accessibility for all throughout the whole journey, while the legal frameworks lack behind in ensuring that this will happen.

References
Eurostat (2003): Eurostat news release 142/2003 - 5 December 2003.

Tennøy, Aud and Merethe Dotterud Leiren (2008): Accessible public transport. A view of Europe today – policies, laws and guidelines. Delivery 1 to the Euro Access project.

Tennøy, Aud og Jan Usterud Hanssen (2007): Policies, legal frameworks and other means for improving accessibility of public transport systems in the Nordic countries. TØI report 926/2007.


The report is the deliverable from work package 1 Review of current policies and regulations within the project For a European Accessibility of Public Transport for People with Disabilities (Euro Access), funded by the DG Research of the European Commission, under the 6th framework programme. Partners in the project are INRETS, CERTU, Ann Frye Ltd, University of Lund, TIS-PT and TØI. Subcontractors are FiT Consulting and UBZ.
For more information, see the Euro Access web site.


/Aud Tennøy, Senior research planner, TØI