How to Get There? A Critical Assessment of Accessibility Objectives and Indicators in Metropolitan Transportation Plans

Accessibility, the ease of reaching destinations, is increasingly seen as a complimentary and in some cases alternative to the mobility oriented planning paradigm, as it allows capturing the complex interactions between land use and transportation systems while providing a social perspective on transportation planning. However, although accessibility has been extensively researched in the last decades, it is still largely marginalized in transportation planning practice. Accordingly, the aim of this study is to critically assess how accessibility is incorporated into metropolitan transportation plans and translated into performance indicators around the world, to ultimately derive policy recommendations. This research assesses 32 recent metropolitan transport plans from North America, Europe, Australia and Asia with respect to their goals, objectives and performance indicators. The results suggest that there is a trend toward a greater integration of accessibility objectives in transport plans, yet few plans have accessibility-based indicators that can guide their decision-making processes. Our findings show that in order to foster accessibility-based approaches to transportation planning, plans need to have clearly defined accessibility goals with a distinction between accessibility and mobility. Furthermore, multi-criteria analysis approaches including accessibility indicators need to guide the decision-making process. This study contributes to a greater understanding of the challenges and successes associated with implementing accessibility in transport planning.