Accessibility and Public Transport Research at UCL

Public Participation Processes in Transport (PUPPIT)

Description

Public participation is of exceptional importance if Government wishes to adopt - and be seen to adopt - inclusion in its decision making. Decisions are often seen by the public as coming from on high with no concern for local feeling, needs or outlooks. In the past, government has encouraged local authorities to consult with the public in the process of adopting plans and policies. In too many cases consultation has been minimal - if present at all - and carried out in a way that enables the authority to “tick the box” to assure central government that the public has been consulted while retaining little or no regard for the public’s views. This “tick box culture” has led to a general feeling amongst the public that they are not consulted, or if they are it is to no avail.

The PUPPIT project will take the methodology and outcomes discussed by Tyler & Brown (2000), extend and apply them to the implementation of some accessible bus stops in Brighton and Hove as part of Brighton and Hove Council's (BHC) programme of improving accessibility to public transport.

To achieve this, the following objectives will be met:

to carry out and facilitate a public participation exercise related to BHC’s accessible bus stop programme
to monitor and evaluate the process to produce a meaningful assessment of participation in the decision process
to facilitate training in public participation processes for the local authority personnel

The PUPPIT project will carry out a public participation exercise associated with the design of bus stops in Brighton and Hove as part of BHC’s on-going project to redesign all its bus stops to make them fully accessible. This will provide a concrete example of decision making in which the public can be involved and will allow evaluation of, and comparison with, previous and current consultation exercises carried out as part of the same project.

The incorporation of the public participation meetings into the “standard” implementation process accords neatly with BHC’s structural change from a centralised to neighbourhood-based approach to decision making, with the associated emphasis on local participation that this will bring.

Contact

Nick Tyler

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Last updated June 2001

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