COMMUNITY RAIL

from Rail Professional October 2022

PEOPLE

Embedding Social Value and Accessibility

Jools Townsend, Chief Executive of Community Rail Network explains how the grassroots network is strengthening our communities by putting social value at the forefront

With the Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail and the creation of Great British Railways (GBR), we are all looking forward to a new era for rail, with it playing a more central role within our communities and a sustainable transport future. At Community Rail Network, we are engaged in active dialogue with partners in government and the rail industry, including the GBR Transition Team, to support the shift to a more community-focused railway that is inclusive and accessible for all and delivers maximum social value, now and for generations to come.

Community rail partnerships and groups across Britain work to develop and cement the place of railways and stations at the heart of local communities. This growing, thriving grassroots movement, brought together under Community Rail Network’s umbrella, now includes 76 community rail partnerships (CRPs) and 1,200+ station friends’ groups and other local groups, spread across Britain. These are community based and led groups and organisations, working closely with the rail industry, and delivering increasingly wide-ranging activities to: • Enhance the railways’ contribution to local sustainable development and community wellbeing, including by maximising access to and use of the railways. • Ensure the community has a voice and plays a part in the development and improvement of our railways, so this meets community needs and aspirations and delivers maximum benefit. • Communicate the development and importance of our railways to communities, enhancing understanding and pride, and promoting rail as a key part of sustainable, healthy travel.

for Transport’s Community Rail Development Strategy: providing a voice for communities; promoting sustainable, healthy, and accessible travel; bringing communities together and supporting diversity and inclusion; and social and economic development. As this strategy shows, community rail is at its heart all about creating greater social value from our railways: helping communities to benefit more, and in different ways, from their stations and local lines. Within the movement itself there is an increasing attention to how we can not only demonstrate the impact that our own projects have, but how our work naturally shines a light on the difference that rail makes every day to people’s lives.

We were pleased to see social value referenced explicitly in the recent consultation around the GBR legislation, as our members’ work shows how social value can be given greater weighting to enable the ambitions of Williams-Shapps, towards a more people-centric, community-responsive, sustainable railway, to be fully realised.

Embracing social value

Community rail already works closely with rail industry partners to eke out greater social value from rail in a range of ways. However, there are opportunities for further development through the process of transformation. We suggest that we can take inspiration from community rail, to consider how rail (and perhaps transport generally) can be approached in a more engaging, participatory, collaborative way, working with communities and local leaders as partners. This aligns with the arguments of a growing range of transport academics looking at how we can shift towards more sustainable and inclusive transport.

Specifying GBR’s duties around maximising social value and ensuring communities are engaged meaningfully, can help to enshrine this approach. Drawing on community rail’s insights, and wider research, we can see how this could support and accelerate the cultural and procedural shift towards a truly people and communitycentric railway, complementing and supporting other duties around accessibility and the environment.

An example of how this could work, and unleash major benefits, relates to the management of stations, where social value could be considered alongside potential commercial value when considering how station spaces, and especially disused buildings, can be put to more productive use. We have seen scores of projects in recent years where stations have been rejuvenated into community hubs through communityled projects supported by the railway and ourselves, with activities as varied as hospital radio stations, free food shops, community bike hires, community meeting and events spaces, art galleries, community cafes, museums and more.

These projects are based on community

ideas and needs, often bringing many partners together, with community rail acting as the ‘glue,’ and founded on shared commitment to benefit local communities. Our experience suggests that by giving social value greater consideration with regards to our stations, we can bring more of these projects to fruition, and avoid missed opportunities where disused spaces remain an empty drain on rail resources.

Ensuring accessibility

Opening up rail travel to more people, working with rail partners to make rail more inclusive and accessible, is a common thread through community rail, and our experience suggests this is often where greatest gains can be made with social value – in some cases transforming lives – as well as contributing to sustainability. It means thinking beyond 'the passenger’ (i.e. those using rail already), to those who don’t or rarely use rail, for whom by breaking down barriers, we can open up new opportunities.

We all recognise that a key part of rail transformation is working to better meet the needs of people with disabilities and other mobility needs or vulnerabilities, as well as breaking down travel barriers for all who face them. Addressing these issues effectively means working with local communities, to understand local needs, issues, and concerns, and in the process, we can empower local people and marginalised groups and create a sense of ownership towards rail, offering strong support to the Levelling Up agenda.

We have many examples in community rail of initiatives that draw on lived experience – such as from those living with dementia, young people with learning disabilities, or new parents from low-income backgrounds – feeding these views and voices into the rail industry to support improvements, while empowering these groups through positive experiences and links to new opportunities.

These examples show how improving accessibility and inclusivity within the rail estate goes hand-in-hand with engaging and being responsive to communities, and how we can unleash social value in multiple, reinforcing ways by combining our thinking on accessibility with community engagement.

Williams-Shapps also recognised a need for a ‘more inclusive culture’ and decisionmaking that considers the needs of nonpassengers who might be enabled, through change, to use rail in the future. Again, this inherently involves dialogue and listening to diverse voices, drawing on work taking place and views being expressed at a grassroots level. We see in community rail how initiatives founded on listening, responding, and empowering can profoundly transform lives and strengthen communities, through initiatives such as: • Rail confidence programmes, particularly for young people and groups who feel marginalised/excluded from rail. • ‘Try the train’ trips and sociable, supported journeys for families, or groups with additional needs. • Guided walks, bikeability, travel planning and route improvements to enhance active travel access. • Working with community transport providers or setting up new inclusive bus connections, such as demand responsive electric minibuses. • Projects to make the railway more inclusive for those with hidden disabilities such as dementia or autism, including engaging these groups and gathering their input, rail staff training, as well as physical adjustments to stations. • Arts and creative projects that celebrate diversity and bring people together with the railway as a focus and shared interest and make stations more visually welcoming and inclusive and encourage social interactions. • Inclusive volunteering opportunities promoting social confidence and skills. By considering accessibility holistically, and recognising how it is delivered in partnership with communities, GBR has the potential to open up and transform travel for a hugely diverse range of passengers, while empowering communities to take action, strengthen local bonds, and create local benefit.

‘Community rail partnerships will be empowered to strengthen rail’s social and economic impact.’

Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail

Looking to the future

‘Community rail can be at the vanguard of supporting the government and rail industry to unlock the social value of the railways, and be bold in doing that.’ – Department for Transport, Community Rail Development Strategy.

‘Community rail partnerships will be empowered to strengthen rail’s social and economic impact.’ – Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail.

The potential for community rail to deliver social value in connection with the railway, and contribute positively to multiple policy areas, is acknowledged by government and industry partners, and Community Rail Network continues to advise on how the role of the movement can be maintained and enhanced.

While the current period of transformation can provoke feelings of uncertainty, it is also a time to embrace the opportunities change can bring.

The Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail asserts that the railways must become more inclusive, accessible, sustainable, and responsive to local needs, including embedding the principles of social value. Our evidence base outlines the numerous ways that community rail provides an ideal vehicle for this. Putting social value, inclusion, and accessibility at the forefront of rail industry thinking now, and recognising how this in bound up with the local engagement typified by community rail, will ensure our railways play a powerful role at the heart of our communities into the future.