Driving urban transformation

Academics from The University of Manchester have co-designed solutions that help to mitigate social exclusion with regards to transport.

Professor Karen Lucas, Emma Tsoneva and Joanna Barrow from the Manchester Urban Institute at The University of Manchester received a Humanities Strategic Civic Engagement Fund (HSCEF) award in 2023 for their project on reducing transport poverty. This funding scheme, which is the University’s Faculty of Humanities’ flagship social responsibility fund, offers support to projects that are inspired by the University’s Greater Manchester location, and which seek to improve communities across the city-region.

Their work addresses public transport provision through the Greater Manchester Bee Network and issues of transport-related social exclusion (TRSE), which often denies marginalised groups access to essential services. By co-producing a blueprint for community engagement in local transport planning, particularly in under-served areas of Greater Manchester, they provided actionable recommendations to inform the development of more socially equitable services. Their project demonstrated that creative, participatory approaches can play a key role in driving local policy development.

The project team said: “By engaging with community and public stakeholders in a process of co-production, our research contributes to more inclusive transport planning and has a tangible, positive impact on local lives. Our work has established a new framework for engaging with outlying and marginalised communities, ensuring that their experiences and insights drive local policy development.”

As a direct result of this work, Joanna Barrow has secured funding for a 12-month secondment to Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM). This provides the opportunity to work with TfGM to embed recommendations from the pilot study work in Hindley and Sholver to improve practice and to inform development of the GM Transport Strategy to 2040. 

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