• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About DNS
  • Subscribe to DNS
  • Advertise with DNS
  • Support DNS
  • Contact DNS

Disability News Service

the country's only news agency specialising in disability issues

  • Home
  • Independent Living
    • Arts, Culture and Sport
    • Crime
    • Education
    • Employment
    • Housing
    • Transport
  • Activism & Campaigning
  • Benefits & Poverty
  • Politics
  • Human Rights
You are here: Home / Transport / Disabled people ‘at the heart’ of new accessible transport centre
A wheelchair-user uses a ramp to board a bus

Disabled people ‘at the heart’ of new accessible transport centre

By John Pring on 16th February 2023 Category: Transport

Listen

Disabled people are “at the heart” of a pioneering new centre that will research and develop accessible transport solutions, its launch event heard this week.

The new National Centre for Accessible Transport (NCAT) aims to improve the accessibility and reliability of road, rail and air transport for disabled people.

Its research and agenda will be led by disabled people, and it aims to amplify the voices of disabled people in all its decision-making.

The project is led by Coventry University, alongside the disabled-led Research Institute for Disabled Consumers (RiDC), the charity Designability, innovation accelerator Connected Places Catapult, cross-party thinktank Policy Connect and engineering consultancy WSP UK.

They have been awarded £20 million over seven years by the charity Motability* to develop and run the centre, which is based at the university’s National Transport Design Centre.

The new centre aims to transform the sector’s understanding of disabled people’s experiences of transport, through carrying out research and developing accessible transport solutions.

Stephanie McPherson-Brown, a disabled postgraduate researcher at NCAT who is researching disabled people’s experiences of public transport, particularly those with reduced mobility, told yesterday’s (Wednesday) launch event: “I have never felt like I could take my independence for granted and it’s something that’s very important to me, but also comes with a lot of challenges.”

She said the impact of inaccessible transport affects not just getting to work, or school, or the hospital, but also the ability to socialise, see friends and “to be spontaneous just like everyone else”.

She said: “I live in Scotland, so there’s so much on my doorstep and it should be accessible to me to just say I’m going to be completely spontaneous today and go somewhere that I want to go.

“Those are the things that really help to improve things like social inclusion and to harbour a sense of self-esteem.”

She said it was important that the centre’s work was being led by disabled people.

She added: “I just feel I can’t actually describe how important this work is and the honour I feel to be a part of it, and also the excitement to just see it grow.”

Professor Paul Herriotts, NCAT’s director, told the launch event that there were “world-class people in user-centred design” at the university, and he added: “What we have found is that it is critical to put users at the heart of the design and engineering process.

“When we work with the end users from day one, and understand their needs and wants and abilities, and then work with them to co-create solutions, then we will have successful outcomes.”

RiDC, which specialises in inclusive research involving disabled consumers, will play a key role in ensuring that disabled people are at the heart of the centre’s work and shape “accessible transport solutions”.

This will include developing and managing a new Community for Accessible Transport, a pan-impairment panel of disabled people which will help set the centre’s agenda by providing evidence and insight through surveys, focus groups, testing, and research design.

Dr Phil Friend, chair of RiDC, said ahead of the launch: “We know, from our research and lived experience, how crucial travel is to being able to live independent and fulfilling lives.

“NCAT has been developed to ensure that it is disabled people themselves who advise on the solutions and services they need in this area.

“Our role in the coalition is to provide high quality research from the lived experience of disabled people – which will inform decision-making in UK government, industry and civil society.”

The disabled peer and accessible transport campaigner Baroness [Tanni] Grey-Thompson said before the launch that it was a “really important endeavour”, and that she hoped it would “challenge the status quo and ensure disabled people have the same right to travel as everybody else”.

She said there had been some positive changes to inclusive transport in her lifetime, but it “has not gone far enough”.

Research by Motability (PDF) has found that disabled people make an average of 38 per cent fewer trips than non-disabled people – with an average of 20 journeys a week for non-disabled people, compared with about 12 for disabled people – with no reduction in this gap over the past decade.

Motability’s analysis shows that completely closing this gap for disabled people in the UK would deliver benefits worth about £72 billion a year.

Rachael Badger, director of performance and engagement at Motability, said: “While some progress has been made in terms of making transport more accessible, we want to see that gap closing, and we want to see change on a larger scale to make transport more inclusive.”

*Motability, the charity which oversees the company that runs the disabled people’s car scheme, is a Disability News Service subscriber

Picture: An RiDC panel member boarding a bus

 

A note from the editor:

Please consider making a voluntary financial contribution to support the work of DNS and allow it to continue producing independent, carefully-researched news stories that focus on the lives and rights of disabled people and their user-led organisations.

Please do not contribute if you cannot afford to do so, and please note that DNS is not a charity. It is run and owned by disabled journalist John Pring and has been from its launch in April 2009.

Thank you for anything you can do to support the work of DNS…

Share this post:

Share on X (Twitter)Share on FacebookShare on WhatsAppShare on RedditShare on LinkedIn

Tags: Accessible transport Coventry Coventry University Motability National Centre for Accessible Transport RIDC

A photograph shows an audience raising their hands in a BSL sign. The words say: 'BSL Conference 2025. The future starts with us. Leeds 17-18 July. Be part of shaping the future of Deaf cultures and identities. Get 10% off with BDA10'

Related

Frustration after government only issues partial ban on new floating bus stops
10th July 2025
Report suggests five big ideas that could transform disabled people’s mobility
10th July 2025
Government’s ‘weak’ response to damning transport access report puts right to travel in ‘grave danger’
19th June 2025

Primary Sidebar

On the left of the image are multiple heads of different colours - white, aqua, red, light brown, and dark green - all grouped together, then the words ‘Campaign for Disability Justice. Sign up to support. #OpportunitySecurityRespect’
A photograph shows an audience raising their hands in a BSL sign. The words say: 'BSL Conference 2025. The future starts with us. Leeds 17-18 July. Be part of shaping the future of Deaf cultures and identities. Get 10% off with BDA10'

Access

Latest Stories

Government ignores warnings of new DWP deaths, and UN intervention, as MPs pass universal credit cuts bill

Urgent letter from UN to Labour government warns: We think your cuts continue Tory attack on disability rights

Race against time to secure DWP deaths evidence before parliament passes new benefit cuts bill

‘Complete shift in thinking’ needed on education of disabled children, says ALLFIE

Minister ignored concerns from disabled advisers, months before publishing cuts bill

Frustration after government only issues partial ban on new floating bus stops

Report suggests five big ideas that could transform disabled people’s mobility

My new book shows exactly why we need the disability movement, says disabled author

‘Disastrous’ cuts bill that leaves legacy of distrust and distress ‘must be dropped’

Four disabled Labour MPs stand up to government over cuts to disability benefits

Advice and Information

Readspeaker
A photograph shows an audience raising their hands in a BSL sign. The words say: 'BSL Conference 2025. The future starts with us. Leeds 17-18 July. Be part of shaping the future of Deaf cultures and identities. Get 10% off with BDA10'

Footer

The International Standard Serial Number for Disability News Service is: ISSN 2398-8924

  • Accessibility Statement
  • Privacy Policy
  • Site map
  • Bluesky
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Threads
  • Twitter

Copyright © 2025 Disability News Service

Site development by A Bright Clear Web