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Accessibility Strategy
Accessibility planning tackles the problems of disadvantaged groups and areas and promotes social inclusion. It concentrates on access to opportunities that are likely to have most impact on life chances: employment, education, health care and fresh food shops.
These opportunities are seen as important in the Community Plans or Strategies for all seven Metropolitan Authorities, so the Accessibility Strategy, set out in the Annexe, addresses them as high-level objectives.
Our Accessibility Strategy is based on a three-level approach:
- strategic-level analytical evidence produced by the Accession software
- discussions with Local Strategic Partnerships, Primary Care Trusts, Local Education Authorities and providers of transport for people who cannot use conventional public transport. Recently established Access Forums have brought these groups together
- building on work in disadvantaged areas such as Regeneration Zones, and work on access to facilities such as New Cross Hospital in Wolverhampton
We have undertaken a number of pilot projects to develop our knowledge and capability. For example, a study in the East Birmingham / North Solihull Regeneration Zone has gone through a ‘trial run’ of the recommended five stages of accessibility planning to discover any pitfalls in our approach.
Other studies are examining local access issues, such as access to jobs in a disadvantaged ward and to post-16 education in Walsall.
The particular needs of the rural Meriden Gap will be addressed, recognising that accessibility problems here are likely to be different from those in urban areas.