Suggested Citation:
Venkataram, Prashanth S., Justin Flynn, Md Musfiqur Rahman Bhuiya, Jesus M. Barajas, Susan L. Handy (2023)

Framing Availability and Usability of Transportation for People With Disabilities

Transportation planning researchers use the term “accessibility” to characterize the ability of people to reach jobs, school, healthcare and other services and activities. Disability scholars use that term to characterize the ability of people with disabilities to use transportation modes where and when present. In the United States of America (US), transportation policymakers’ use of the latter definition only for minimal legal compliance at the expense of the former definition, without synthesizing both definitions, has led to real-world negative consequences for transportation for people with disabilities, including when new train lines lead to consolidation of bus routes and in regulatory debates about how ridehailing services may serve people with disabilities. Thus, in the context of transportation policy, we propose a new set of terms that, when used consistently, can more accurately distinguish these concepts. These terms are “provider-view availability”, referring to where & when a transportation mode is present or legal to use, “immediate usability”, referring to the ease of interacting with a vehicle or (physical or digital) infrastructure upon encountering it, “user-view availability”, referring to how some people cannot start trips on a given mode due to severe problems with immediate usability, and “cumulative usability”, referring to the challenges that users of a certain mode may face more often as trip times or distances increase. We argue that transportation policymakers in the US could more accurately characterize holistic problems with transportation facing people with disabilities by consistently using these terms and thereby mitigate similar negative consequences going forward.