Transport has a major impact on rural communities, both socially and economically. Having access to a vehicle, be it a private car, motor cycle, van, bus or any other mode of community transport is a necessity to enable normal daily living in the 21st Century. A lack of adequate and affordable transport can affect people’s ability to:
When a population is widely dispersed across a large area, it can create difficulties in accessing services for example supermarket or fuel deliveries and essential medical supplies and equipment. Communities in rural West Somerset are particularly isolated; in parts of Exmoor households can be on average around 40 minutes by public transport from their nearest food store and 50 minutes from a GP.
Barriers to Housing and Services is one of the seven domains which make up the DCLG’s Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD). The IMD ranks all areas of England in terms of relative deprivation, down to small geographical areas (LSOAs). In respect of barriers to housing and services, Somerset has three of the top six ‘most deprived’ areas (from a total of 32,482 nationally), all of which relate to West Somerset. For further details, see our webpage on IMD in Somerset
As may be expected, car ownership is high in rural Somerset (see map below, and more detail on our dashboard) with around half of households having at least two vehicles. Accessibility may be a particular issue however for the one in nine households in rural Somerset who have access to one car/van or no vehicles at all.
Proportion of households with no access to car or van
Source: ONS Census 2011
Older People and Rural Transport
Older women are particularly affected by a lack of transport, especially if they outlive their partner as they are less likely to drive a car. In Somerset, the female to male ratio of non-car ownership for the 65+ age group is around 3:1 across all three rural-urban classifications, with rural towns marginally the higher ratio and urban the lowest (see table below)
While older people (and those of other ages, too) are less likely to have access to private transport if they live in towns, there are nevertheless around 2,700 women and 900 men aged 65 or over living in rural villages with no access to car or van, which can often contribute to increased social isolation and poorer wellbeing.
Female 65+ No car | Male 65+ No car | % Female 65+ No car | % Male 65+ No car | |
Rural village and dispersed | 2,679 | 903 | 15.2% | 5.6% |
Rural town and fringe | 3,547 | 1,070 | 28.0% | 10.4% |
Urban city and town | 9,886 | 3,389 | 35.0% | 15.3% |
% based on those living in a residential household, not communal establishments.
Source: ONS Census 2011
In June 2015, the International Longevity Centre (ILC-UK) and Age UK published a report entitled „The Future of Transport in an Ageing Society“?. Using results of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (2012-13), findings include:-
Tackling rural isolation in Somerset
Much of rural Somerset relies on voluntary and neighbourly transport provision in the form of community car and moped loan schemes and informal lifts. By its nature these services have little or no strategic co-ordination, and there remain many gaps. Bus companies provide services where these are profitable or where they receive public subsidies to compensate. Here are some facts and figures about rural transport in the county:-
Total Transport Project
the Department for Transport's Total Transport Pilot Fund awarded Somerset CC £305,000 towards the development of a transport information, journey planning and booking web portal. This is intended to be a ‘one-stop-shop’ for all passenger transport related services in Somerset and provide functionality to journey plan with ‘alternative’ transport such as community transport and community car schemes, as well as public bus services. Other features include a ‘noticeboard’ to assist with car sharing and to facilitate individual transport requests to operators, online applications for concessionary passes and county tickets, and an interactive map.
The Total Transport web portal will contribute to tackling rural isolation by providing improved access to information on alternative services, many of which operate in rural areas affected by a lack of public bus services. It will also capture valuable information on the passenger transport network and demand across different services and geographic regions, providing operators with statistics to facilitate better service coordination and evaluation. Development is soon to commence, with an estimated launch date in Autumn 2018.
Further Information:
A total of 31,761 Somerset residents in 2011 were born outside the UK, half of which arrived in the last 10 years. 5,287 residents were born in Poland, more than any other country outside the British Isles. - 2011 Census