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Developing socially inclusive transportation policy: transferring the United Kingdom policy approach to the State of Victoria?

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Abstract

The role of transport disadvantage in the social exclusion of low income and marginalised households and communities has received increasing academic and policy interest over the last 10 years or so. Against a backdrop of studies that have predominantly considered this issue within various national contexts, this paper offers a unique opportunity to compare different national context. The paper is informed by a commissioned study for the State of Victoria Department of Transport (Lucas, Study of transport exclusion in the state of Victoria: It doesn’t have to be this way, 2008), which wished to draw lessons from the United Kingdom in order to promote a similar policy agenda for the State. It is the authors’ contention that the issue of transport-related social exclusion is likely receive growing international policy recognition in the context of global recession, associated local job losses and reduced disposable incomes, as well as the ageing structure of most Western societies. The paper seeks to disseminate the important findings of our study about the potential for policy transfer to other national and local contexts to a wider academic, policy and practitioner audience.

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Notes

  1. Under the devolved governmental arrangements that were put in place by central government in 1998, Scotland Wales, Northern Ireland and Greater London are responsible for developing their own transport policies and local authority guidances, while England continues to be governed and legislated for by the UK Government and UK Parliament. Throughout this paper, therefore, when looking at the policies that were developed for transport and social exclusion we refer to those that were developed by central government but which are only implemented by local authorities in England (outside of Greater London). In practice, however, similar policy approaches have been adopted by all the other devolved administrations.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Ray Kinnear, Deputy Director of Public Transport Strategic Policy and Planning and Emily Simatos, Senior Policy Advisor at VICDOT for their support with this project.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Transport Studies Unit, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

    Karen Lucas

  2. Institute of Transport Studies, Monash University, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

    Graham Currie

Authors
  1. Karen Lucas
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  2. Graham Currie
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Correspondence to Karen Lucas.

Appendix 1

Appendix 1

Participating organisations in the Victoria study

Bus Association Victoria

  • Department of Infrastructure (now Department of Transport)

    • Accessible Transport Division

    • Public Transport Division (Metropolitan Victoria)

    • Public Transport Division (Regional and Rural Victoria)

    • Research and Transport Planning Division

    • Sustainable Transport Division

  • Department of Planning and Community Development

  • Department of Education and Early Childhood Development

  • Department of Health

  • Department of Human Services

  • East Gippsland College of Further Education

  • Lake Tyers Aboriginal Community

  • Melton, Hepburn and East Gippsland local authorities

  • Melton Community Transport project

  • Monash University

  • TeleBus Victoria

  • Transport Connections Programme officers in Melton, Hepburn and East Gippsland

  • Transport and Social Inclusion Advisory Committee

  • Travellers’ Aid Australia

  • Victoria Council of Social Services

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Lucas, K., Currie, G. Developing socially inclusive transportation policy: transferring the United Kingdom policy approach to the State of Victoria?. Transportation 39, 151–173 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11116-011-9324-2

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