Developing a Fuzzy-Logic Method for Evaluating the Accessibility of Disable People to Public Transportation in Rural Communities

PI: Mohammadsoroush (Tommy) Tafazzoli (WSU), tommy.tafazzoli@wsu.edu, ORCID: 0000-0003-4946-3666

Co PIs: none

AMOUNT & MATCH: $40,000 from PacTrans; $40,000 Match

PERFORMANCE PERIOD: 8/16/2019 – 8/15/2021

STATUS: Active

CATEGORIES: Accessibility, Disabilities, Public Transportation, Rural Communities

RESEARCH PROJECT HOT SHEET:

UTC PROJECT DOCUMENTATION:

FINAL PROJECT REPORT: will be available once completed

PROJECT DATA: will be available once completed

DESCRIPTION: This research will introduce a method that will comprehensively evaluate the accessibility of public transportation services for disabled people in rural areas. The proposed approach will fill the gap of the existing evaluation methods by transforming the existing transportation-quality evaluation to an accessibility-quality evaluation focused on disabled people in rural areas, by evaluating accessibility for four major disability types, and by introducing a fuzzy-logic assessment that generates a quantitative score for the evaluation.

The research is expected to have the following benefits:

  1. detecting the accessibility issues based on the disability type that leads to meeting the demands of people from various disability groups (not just wheelchair users)
  2. maximizing the efficiency of the investments in improving the accessibility by prioritizing different measures based on scores with universal interpretations
  3. contributing to the health, vitality, well-being, and economic independence of disabled people living in rural areas
DELIVERABLE DUE DATE DATE RECEIVED
Research Project Progress Report #1 4/10/2020
Research Project Progress Report #2 10/10/2020
Research Project Progress Report #3 4/10/2021
No Cost Extension Request 6/15/2021
Draft Report 6/15/2021
Final Project Report 8/15/2021