A Proposed Accessibility Score to Aid Public Spaces and Infrastructure Planning

Team Name

Team In2Teq

Team Members

Project Description

Planning the use of finite spaces within our communities should always consider sustainable use. Thus, before anything is built, re-purposed, or revitalised, first we ask: how many people are already in the area, and how much more will it add?

Then we consider the mobility of people. How will people get to and from the place? Will it be by public transport, private vehicle, or alternatives?

If people will use public transport, is public transportation available? Are there bus stops or train stations within walking distance? Even if there are, what is the capacity of the buses and the trains? There may be a bus stop yet buses can no longer take in passengers when they get there.

If people will use a private vehicle, will there be parking available nearby? Will there be sufficient parking? How much will it add to the existing volume of cars? Will the roads be sufficient for the extra volume?

If people will use alternative modes of transport, is it accessible on foot? Is it accessible by bike? How safe is it for pedestrians, for cyclists and just for anybody in general?

Finally, we consider well-being. Does the community feel safe? Are public spaces available? How much green cover is there?

Our project is a proposal to supplement existing planning tools by harnessing government open data to answer these questions.

Data Story

We propose an accessibility score for a particular area. Accessibility score will be a function of the NSW Public Transport Accessibility Level (PTAL) and the PTAL equivalent to private and active transport. PTAL is based on accessibility of the public transport network in terms of distance from the nearest bus stop or train station, number of services and waiting times. We’ll enhance it with the data on the capacity of available services based on real-time service occupancy using the Transport for NSW GTFS realtime open data feed.

We will create the Private Transport Accessibility Level, pTAL with the small p. This is the equivalent of the private transport equivalent of the public transport measure, and the pTAL score is based on current volume of registered vehicles in the area, available parking both car parks and kerbside spots, and the road infrastructure in place. For this, we will be using Transport for NSW Vehicle Licensing Datasets, Parking and Council Data, as well as roads dataset within the NSW Digital Cadastral Database which represents an open way for the passage of vehicles, persons or animals on land.

We will further create the Active Transport Accessibility Level which scores availability of foot and cycle paths, elevation and difficulty grades, using both the Active Transport datasets and a subset of the roads dataset.

Every community should have green cover and access to public spaces. Information on the availability of, or proximity to, both green and public spaces will be made available using NSW Urban Vegetation Cover data and the NSW Public Spaces location data. The Government Property Index will also provide insight on government property utilisation, from which suitable candidates can be identified to be repurposed as public spaces.

These will be overlaid with the geolocated crime statistics from BOCSAR. People need to feel safe in their communities and in shared spaces. Crime data will provide insight on which areas will need preventative intervention, such as better lighting, more suitable vegetation, pedestrian access and facilities.

Whilst it is not government open data, we are also using Google Mobility as well as Apple Mobility data and will be open to use similar non-government but available data. This will further inform use and activation of shared spaces, particularly public spaces.