Rural Resilience: The Role for Innovative Public Transportation

Access to employment, education, health care, and shopping is essential for any community. In rural communities, these destinations typically require access to a private vehicle or public transit given the distances involved and the lack of sidewalks, bike lanes, and other active transport systems. Rural communities can be particularly vulnerable to climate change as they may lack the human adaptive capacity to plan for and respond to climate-related natural disasters and generally possess more rigid transport systems. Our work reviews the provision of rural public transit in Maine and similar rural states and makes recommendations on how innovative public transit can enhance mobility and add to rural resilience. In addition, we explore applied and theoretical applications of on-demand transit and microtransit. We note that ongoing, stable funding for public transit and rural public transit continues to be a challenge.