Public Social Partnership: Case Study - SPT Community Transport A Case Example from the Organisational Learning Champions Gallery February 2017
Public Social Partnership: SPT Community Transport Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) is the Regional Transport Partnership (and Public Transport Authority) for the west of Scotland, established by the Transport (Scotland) Act 2005, covering 11 full council areas and part of one other. Regional Transport Partnerships (RTPs) were established by the Transport (Scotland) Act 2005 with the purpose of delivering and coordinating transport solutions which were cross-boundary, multimodal, and partnership focused.
PSP Case Studies: SPT Community Transport Page 1 Public Social Partnership: SPT Community Transport Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) is the Regional Transport Partnership (and Public Transport Authority) for the west of Scotland, established by the Transport (Scotland) Act 2005, covering 11 full council areas and part of one other. Regional Transport Partnerships (RTPs) were established by the Transport (Scotland) Act 2005 with the purpose of delivering and co-ordinating transport solutions which were crossboundary, multi-modal, and partnership focused. Background SPT sees community transport (CT) providers as an essential part of future public transport provision, especially in times of financial constraint, which will see the demand for socially necessary community transport provision continuing to grow against the backdrop of an ageing population. They have clearly recognised the importance of a strong Community Transport sector and, as well as providing significant financial support to the sector, sought to strengthen the sector by launching the West of Scotland Community Transport Network in March 2013. The Network is a partnership between SPT and the CT sector in the West of Scotland and has been established to assist in bringing coordination, enhanced quality and better use of resources within CT. The two main roles of the network are to (i) Develop existing provision within the sector and encourage new initiatives; and (ii) Provide a membership organisation through which advice, support and training can be delivered. In delivering these aims, the network seeks to: Work in partnership with CT providers at a local and regional level; Enable improved outcomes for service users and increasing social value for the local community; Developing sustainable transport services; Build the capacity of community transport in the SPT area; Provide training and information to providers; Develop, implement and monitor best practice and quality standards in the delivery of community transport; and Support network members by providing links to other members for the purpose of sharing resources and information To ensure that the Network is an effective partnership between SPT and the community transport sector in the West of Scotland, a Steering Group was established to oversee its development. The group is chaired by SPT and comprises of representatives from Community Transport Operators and The Community Transport Association in Scotland. During conversations between SPT and the Network members, it was agreed that the overall aims of the network could be achieved and strengthened and socially necessary community and demand responsive transport (DRT) services developed and improved, through the development of a Public Social Partnership.
Page 2 Public Social Partnership: Case Study - SPT Community Transport Scope and Focus Several proposed projects were identified for potential inclusion in the Public Social Partnership (PSP). As SPT and the network members were new to the PSP model, it was agreed that the initial scope should be limited to those projects that were essential to the development and future success of the CT sector. Remaining focused in this way would allow all partners to learn and develop throughout the process, with the potential to use the PSP model to a greater extent in future. As a result, two workstreams were identified and agreed as the focus of this PSP: Delivery of Community and Demand Responsive Transport (DRT) Services This workstream seeks to design, pilot and implement innovative transport solutions for communities through a process of user engagement and the development and delivery of pilot services operated by community transport operators with a view to tendering these services if successful after the pilot phase; CT Capability & Capacity Growth The focus of this workstream is on mitigating an impending gap in skills provision through driver training, volunteering and employment; building the IT infrastructure to enable more efficient scheduling of community transport; and mapping the capacity and capability of the CT sector in the West of Scotland. This workstream seeks to ensure that volunteering provides opportunities to those who are long-term unemployed; those looking at a change of career; and/or those returning to the workplace, as well as younger people looking to develop new skills. Progress made by the PSP to date In the first instance, a considered and structured approach was adopted by the SPT lead to ensure the foundations and governance for the PSP were clearly articulated and that clear processes were in place for the development of the design and piloting phases. A dedicated PSP project coordinator was then appointed and considerable work was done along with the PSP partners which resulted in the identification of initial projects within each workstream, followed by service design and piloting. The pilots were supported by detailed project plans, business cases and the Memorandum of Understanding (which underpins the partnership, sets clear objectives, and assigns roles and responsibilities to respective partners). Pilot delivery As part of the PSP model, pilots are continually monitored for progress against pre-determined success criteria and decisions are taken to adjust, continue or conclude the pilot. In addition, new projects are continually assessed for inclusion in the workstreams. The following highlights the key areas of focus for the PSP workstreams to date: Delivery of Community and Demand Responsive Transport Services North Lanarkshire Transport for Employment, Education and Services (TEES) TEES is a transport pilot which was designed to deliver better transport services to employment sites at Newhouse, Bellshill and Eurocentral; education at New College Lanarkshire; and to create a community bus service to facilitate access to local services in the Salsburgh, Shotts and Harthill areas and re-establish their links to the main inter-city bus routes. Progress to date: A daily scheduled bus service has been running early morning and afternoon to provide transport for passengers working at Newhouse, Bellshill and Eurocentral. The pilot has shown great success with a high uptake in service. As
PSP Case Studies: SPT Community Transport Page 3 a result the pilot is being funded for a 2nd year to allow further review and development of the service; Pilots were initiated to address transport needs for passengers travelling to New College, Lanarkshire and to facilitate access to local services in the Salsburgh, Shotts and Harthill areas. In both cases, patronage of the services was much lower than was indicated in the initial user engagement. As a result the pilot services have stopped. Although disappointing, the partners of the PSP are in agreement as to the significant benefit gained in running a pilot to assess effectiveness of proposed services. South Ayrshire Carrick Villages Service In order to test the PSP model the DRT workstream group resolved to design a pilot around the most extensive user engagement practicable. This pilot comprises a scheduled community bus service to connect isolated rural communities to services and to provide a feeder link to the public transport network. Given the importance of this project, a significant amount of engagement and planning has been done over an extended period of time with local partners to ensure that pilot design reflects the outcomes of the engagement process. The pilot is now due to commence in March 2017. The significance attached to the development of this project has led to its incorporation in a wider programme of work Rural Connect which has attracted a total funding package of 310k from a number of sources. MyBus Group Hire Project Recently this popular service has seen an increase in usage by communities to transport groups of users to community activities. However, the increase in group usage has reduced availability of vehicles for individual users. Following analysis of data a number of regular community club runs were identified using the PSP model and CT partners were consulted to pilot a service to accommodate these runs. The pilot will operate initially for 6 months within North Lanarkshire, Glasgow and North Ayrshire council areas, at which point assessment of results will be undertaken. Monklands Orthopaedics Shuttle Bus In November 2016 the orthopaedic services at Monklands hospital were due to transfer to Wishaw and Hairmyres hospitals. Following concerns from family members of patients regarding access to the other hospitals at visiting times, NHS Lanarkshire and SPT worked in partnership, through the PSP model, as part of the integrated transport hub to pilot a shuttle bus service. The PSP CT partners designed and piloted a service between Monklands, Wishaw and Hairmyres hospitals that ran for a 2 month pilot. During that period, it was found that demand for the service was negligible and the pilot did not continue. However, once again, the pilot stage highlighted the importance of testing services prior to full service commitment. St Andrews Hospice Shuttle Bus St Andrews hospice in Airdrie has embarked on a major refurbishment, which involves the relocation of some wards and services. This involves the transfer of staff, patients and visitors along with medical notes to a temporary location. The hospice approached SPT to consider the provision of a shuttle bus to help support the transfers. Consultation with the hospice, SPT and CT partners followed and has resulted in the design of a service that is being operated by a local CT provider seven days per week between the hospice on Henderson St Airdrie, Drumgelloch train station and Wester Moffat Hospital.
Page 4 Public Social Partnership: Case Study - SPT Community Transport Chapelton Village Shuttle Bus During July 2016 major road works resulted in a road closure on the A76 between East Kilbride and Strathaven. The road closure left the rural village of Chapelton without access to normal bus services. The PSP project was asked to help and in consultation with SPT, the commercial bus operators and CT partner Blantyre Volunteer Group, a shuttle bus service was designed to operate between Chapelton and Strathaven, which linked with the normal service bus and so ensured that residents were able to continue access to the main transport network during the closure period. Capacity and Capability D1 Training Programme This project was designed to develop and deliver a D1 training programme to address the increasing challenges relating to the recruitment of suitably qualified drivers. Progress to date includes: Formation of a workstream sub-group to take forward the detailed design and implementation of the project; Approval of business case to proceed and commencement of operations in January 2015; Three CT partner organisations appointed to deliver training: Getting Better Together, North Lanarkshire; North Area Transport Association, Glasgow; Coalfield Community Transport, East Ayrshire. External trainers were used initially with the aim of knowledge and skills transfer to a fully in-housed based training programme. One partner is now providing all training in-house, with the other two on track to follow; 47 eligible candidates referred by network member organisations to the programme 27 existing employees and 20 volunteers; Of the 47, 31 candidates are under 35 years of age; 18 of 27 have completed training; Of the volunteers, 7 completed training and 5 (2 of whom had been long term unemployed) have gone on to fulltime employment with the other 2 working as volunteer drivers; There are now 4 D1 qualified DATS trainers available to contribute to the Networks training needs; The East Ayrshire programme is being considered for expansion with support from East Ayrshire Council, Ayr College and Job Centre Plus Volunteer Scotland has been involved in promoting volunteering through its website and contacts base. IT Scheduling Software This workstream project is intended to identify and implement IT scheduling software to address operational and efficiency issues by enhancing the effectiveness of work planning and execution and facilitating partnership working. Progress in the workstream includes: Subgroup set up with CT members to determine scheduling requirements. Software package assessed, purchased and tailored where necessary to meet user requirements. Software tested, implemented and fully operational at Southwest CT and South Ayrshire CT. Aim is to continue to expand usage of the system within the CT partners as demand for routing and scheduling capacity grows. In all projects, the core principles of the PSP model are adhered to, in particular: Engaging service users key user beneficiaries are identified and are fully engaged to inform service
PSP Case Studies: SPT Community Transport Page 5 design through user surveys, focus groups and desk research and analysis; Service design and piloting a replicable design process has now been developed that embeds user requirements, engages CT partners and utilises a pilot phase as standard for evaluation prior to full service commitment; Collating evidence of what works using a now well established benefits management methodology, the project collates data and evidence as part of project monitoring to ensure that benefits arising from the PSP projects can be appropriately measured and realised. Key Benefits Adoption of the PSP model in the development and future success of the CT sector has brought numerous benefits including: Designing community transport services that are always targeted to meet user needs, which in turn leads to more effective service delivery; The building of a partnership model that works well and can be used and applied in other circumstances; The application of piloting has proven its worth as a key element of the model; allowing evaluation prior to commissioning service delivery; The opportunity to build capacity and capability of the CT sector as well as increasing the confidence of commissioners in using the CT sector for service delivery; The opportunity to help make the CT sector more sustainable by reducing reliance on grant funding; The opportunity to maximise funding opportunities. Key challenges It should be noted that the PSP process can be complex depending on the size of ambition and can face a number of challenges. In the case of the CT PSP, the challenges addressed have included: Maintaining dedicated resource it is essential to have a focused Project Manager who is able to commit to driving the project forward on a full-time basis and maintain momentum to meet service design and delivery demands. Continuing partner engagement following initial commitment of partners to the PSP, partner engagement is an ongoing activity to ensure that partner communication is clear and effective and partner input is maintained. Building and maintaining knowledge as the PSP has progressed, a great deal of knowledge and experience has been amassed. This will be critical in the continuing successful design and implementation of projects in this PSP and may also be of value in a wider application of the PSP model Managing key stakeholders setting and managing expectations of external stakeholders is critical particularly when, as in some instances, the pilot phase of the project has demonstrated that perceived service demand or need is not always as expected. Timescales The nature of the co-operative model means that the lead in time, particularly for larger projects, can be significant and this has to be allowed for in the project plan.
Page 6 Public Social Partnership: Case Study - SPT Community Transport Critical Success Factors A number of areas have been addressed by SPT and the partnership to date which have been essential in facilitating the progress made so far, and will be critical to the future success of the PSP: Stakeholder buy-in - Obtaining stakeholder buy-in at the earliest possible stage was essential to building the foundations for a successful PSP. This included engaging with legal and procurement representatives to raise awareness of the PSP model and the planned activity but also to understand the different legal and procurement considerations which Regional Transport Partners must take into account. The PSP approach could then be shaped to reflect this; Appointment of a dedicated project manager having a fulltime, focussed resource has been critical in maintaining continuity and pace in project delivery; Flexibility of the PSP model the flexibility of the model has allowed adaptation for different stakeholder situations and application of different methods in service delivery; Equal representation - the PSP has been highly inclusive, with a broad number and range of providers involved. This enables those with a clear contribution a role to play, and allows differing levels of involvement for smaller providers with lower levels of resource; Clear scope - the scope of the PSP was clearly defined and agreed at an early stage and this has helped the partnership to remain focused on the future vision and goals they seek to achieve without becoming bogged down trying to achieve too much, too soon; User engagement - concentrating on identifying and filling service gaps was hugely beneficial, through user engagement the SPT were able to collect data that helped design services that were sought after and provided a robust basis for business case construction and piloting of services; Key Performance Indicators - by identifying the key performance indicators from benefits profiles, the PSP has been able to establish what the important success factors are and evaluate how successful the pilot schemes have been so far. This has helped them to keep on track. Future ambitions The ambition going forward is to embed the PSP model as the default method for the design and delivery of community transport services. The next steps include: Conduct an in depth evaluation of what has been delivered to date with a view to refining the model, future scope and approach, leading to further project initiation in the workstreams; Aim to move some of the successful projects out of the pilot stage to a permanent business as usual footing. This will involve tackling sustainability questions around grant funding or commercial funding routes; Continue the development of the PSP by looking at larger scale pilot projects such as those currently under development in Inverclyde and North Ayrshire to develop a sustainable CT infrastructure in these areas; To make use of the PSP model as part of the West of Scotland Integrated Transport Hub development; Continue to share leading practice assistance to evolving CT PSPs whenever requested e.g. Edinburgh and Dumfries and Galloway.