Everything in a community ages, including its residents. In 2000, 12% of Americans were 65 or older. By 2030, more than 21% will be over that age, and by 2040, more than 12 million Americans are projected to be 85 or older. Economists and actuaries are already issuing warnings about pension shortfalls and rising entitlement costs.

But there’s another age-related issue that local communities must face: helping residents remain healthy, socially engaged, and independent as they grow older.

Mobility is a key aspect of independence. Local government managers who develop multiyear capital spending plans need to consider now how well their transportation infrastructure and services will serve aging residents in the future. For example, a six-lane, 45-m.p.h. thoroughfare with a mile between stoplights is a perilous asphalt moat for slow-moving pedestrians, whether they’re a 75-year-old using a walker or a harried parent shepherding young children across the street. Public administrators must consider key questions to effectively serve our elderly and disabled residents:

1. How well does current transportation infrastructure support their mobility and independence?

2. What barriers prevent access to transportation services in our communities?

3. What policy and funding steps can we take to ensure transportation systems are responsive to the unique needs of older adults and those with disabilities?

This article outlines the 3 C’s—challenges, community capacity, and commitment—that public managers must address to create comprehensive and responsive community transportation systems.

Understanding Challenges

Local government administrators and planners must first evaluate how their current transportation systems meet the needs of older people and individuals with disabilities. This includes assessing pedestrian facilities, transit options, bus stop amenities, and crosswalk intersections. The design of transportation infrastructure directly impacts the ability of older people and individuals with disabilities to move safely and independently in our communities.

However, mobility challenges go beyond physical barriers like poorly designed intersections or broken sidewalks. They’re also bureaucratic, logistical, and financial. Identifying and addressing the transportation difficulties faced by people who cannot drive expands mobility options for all residents, promoting independence for people of all ages, incomes, and abilities.

Assessing Community Capacity

Our research team has been working with partners in the San Antonio–Bexar County region of Texas to understand and improve transportation options for its older and disabled residents. San Antonio, a city of about 1.5 million people, joined the World Health Organization’s Age-Friendly Communities Network in 2014. The network aims to produce safer and more livable places for people of all ages, from toddlers to nonagenarians. Since adopting the Age-Friendly model, the city has launched several planning initiatives to better meet the needs of its older adult residents.

Our team was asked to evaluate the region’s readiness for a One-Call, One-Click (1C1C) transportation system. The goal of a 1C1C program is to make it easy for people who need specialized transportation to register for services, schedule trips, and pay for rides with a single phone call or a single visit to an online app. Using census data, we estimated the Bexar County population most in need of this service—people with disabilities or over age 65 and who live below the federal poverty line—at 74,487 residents.

We analyzed 21 One-Call, One-Click systems nationwide to see how other communities provided mobility services to their “transportation-disadvantaged” populations. Each community’s system was unique. As an example, we found the cost per ride varied tremendously from less than $10 in Manitowoc County, Wisconsin, to more than $70 in the Puget Sound region of Washington state. Some systems included nonprofits agencies with volunteer drivers, some included contracts with for-profit ride-providers, and some had both. Each cobbled together funding from a variety of federal, state, and local sources.

When we focused on Bexar County, we found that many public and private organizations recognized the region’s need for improving specialized transit. In fact, 13 different groups were trying to meet that demand by providing mobility services. But because the agencies worked mostly independently and sometimes competed for the same limited pools of funding, Bexar County had an urgent need for better coordination and more collaboration.

Each of the 13 agencies in the region used different technologies to register clients and schedule trips. Some provided curb-to-curb service, while others offered door-to-door assistance. One organization required that rides be scheduled two weeks in advance; another needed only 48 hours’ notice. The age, income, and disability criteria to qualify for rides varied from agency to agency. Many users, and potential users, reported being confused and frustrated in our surveys and focus groups.

Community Commitment

The transportation difficulties facing low-income older or disabled Bexar County residents are not unique. We believe a well-designed, well-funded One-Call, One-Click system could resolve many of them. But the challenges of establishing a region-wide system all at once are myriad, so we recommended starting with a pilot project in San Antonio.

The “No Rider Left Behind” experiment would develop and test a coordinated process for scheduling trips, sharing data, and providing rides in one city council district. Almost 9,000 transportation-disadvantaged residents live in the target district. That figure is small enough to be manageable, but large enough to prove whether a streamlined, comprehensive transportation system can make a meaningful difference in residents’ quality of life.

As researchers interested in overcoming mobility challenges, we are encouraged that San Antonio’s public and philanthropic leaders wanted to better understand the transportation issues facing older and disabled residents. Funders’ willingness to invest in our study underscores their commitment to develop practical, data-driven solutions. We hope more communities follow San Antonio’s example.

Lessons Learned

The following are five takeaways for public managers who want to make their communities more accessible to residents who need specialized transportation or just don’t own cars:

1. Bring everyone into the conversation.

Talk to everybody involved before trying to develop or improve a comprehensive community transportation system. Consult with users and potential users, transit agencies, charitable foundations, medical system executives, nonprofit and public social service providers, for-profit ride services, area agencies on aging, and regional planning councils. Well-designed, well-maintained infrastructure matters, so bring public works and streets departments into the conversations.

2. Minimize barriers.

The most useful transportation system minimizes geographic and jurisdictional barriers so users can reach regional facilities, such as hospitals or airports. It also minimizes transfers from one mode of transportation to another.

3. Continue to look for new funding and collaborators.

Federal funding is critical but precarious; consistently seek new sources of funding and new collaborators. Expect service providers to be wary of cooperating because they often compete for the same funding. Always budget for ongoing staff training and technology updates.

4. Integrate technology to share key information.

Transportation providers need to harmonize registration procedures and eligibility criteria as much as possible and find ways to share pertinent client information, such as if a rider uses a wheelchair. Different agencies’ technology platforms must be able to interact with one another.

5. Decide who will manage the initiative.

Find a backbone organization to oversee the effort to build and maintain a comprehensive community transportation system. The backbone organization can ensure that service providers standardize data collection and reporting and help develop and monitor system-wide performance metrics to guide improvements. Find civic champions to promote the system to the public, funders, and politicians.

Acknowledgment: I would like to thank our partners, the San Antonio Area Foundation, which manages the Successful Living and Aging in San Antonio (SALSA) collaborative, and Ride Connect Texas, a nonprofit transportation provider, for their support and assistance. I also want to acknowledge team members who contributed to the research project and the writing of this article: Dr. Simon A. Andrew, professor and chair, UNT Department of Public Administration; Dr. Jintak Kim, UNT Research Team; Dr. Sara Ford, UNT Research Team; Jennifer Nagorka, UNT Center for Public Management; and Dr. Sowmya Balachandran, UMass Boston.

LAURA M. KEYES, PhD, AICP, is a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Public Administration at the University of North Texas.