Development and Implementation of an Interactive Data Dashboard for Inclusive Public Transit: Design and Dissemination

Public transit systems represent structural conditions that constrain or liberate how people travel through space. However, data documenting the accessibility of public transit systems in the United States (U.S.) is sparse, not nationally integrated, and rarely communicated in plain language. This research aimed to fill this gap by generating an interactive dashboard for the dissemination of public transit system accessibility data across the top 99 federally funded fixed-route transit systems within the U.S. The University of Michigan Public Transit Accessibility Dashboard was generated by an interdisciplinary team of academic researchers, web developers, artists, and members of the disability community. The resulting product hosts information about public transit accessibility along four dimensions: Accommodation, Adjacency, Availability, and Affordability. The data reveals a wide variability across systems in the U.S. Scores ranged from 16 to 40 for Accommodation, 0.41 to 3564.18 reachable destinations within a 30-min trip for Adjacency, 0.41 to 3.91 arrivals per hour for Availability, and $0 to $161.85 revenue per trip for Affordability. These findings suggest that where riders live may shape whether and how people with disabilities can plan for and use public transit. Sustainable, lasting change depends on accurate information and making information publicly accessible is a first step.