About community transport

Community transport defined

For us, community transport is:

"Any transport service, which is designed, specified, controlled, or otherwise developed by the communities it serves, and which is provided on a not-for-profit basis in direct response to the identified needs of those communities."

What is community transport?

Often referred to by its acronym - CT - community transport began over three decades ago.

Community transport was fighting Social Exclusion twenty years before the term entered popular parlance.

The early focus, mainly using volunteers, was on providing transport for local people and groups who found it difficult or impossible to use public transport.

Since then, CT operations have grown and developed with the changing times. CT operators employ paid professional staff, and are subject to the same rigorous licensing standards as public bus service operators.

Although the days of volunteers running around in an old Transit are long gone, the core ethos remains - supporting and developing local communities, combating social exclusion and promoting economic regeneration by providing accessible, safe, affordable and professional transport services for local people and community groups.

Community transport in Greater Manchester

The community transport sector works away, mostly in the background, providing jobs and services to local people There are CT operators in each of the ten districts - find your local operator.

In the last financial year, CT operators in Greater Manchester:

Community transport - a unique approach

CT has a fundamentally different approach to other transport operators.

This is because community transport is about people and their needs, not profit

For CT operators, the passenger comes first; it's tailored to the needs of the traveller, not the service. Read more about the unique approach of CT.

Community transport - involving communities

Community transport in Greater Manchester relies heavily on the involvement of community members. In 2007-2008, there were over 700 volunteer drivers in the sector, contributing an estimated £190,000 of voluntary labour.

In 2007-2008, Greater Manchester CT operators trained over 500 hundred drivers to the nationally-accredited MiDAS standard.

Community transport provides added value

Investing resources in CT services produces additional community benefit; CT vehicles don't just finish a shift and sit in a garage.

For example:

An accessible minibus delivering transport to employment might, off shift or at weekends, provide transport for excluded groups in the community, who find main bus services do not meet their needs.

Smaller accessible vehicles used for education contracts could, outside morning and afternoon peaks, provide transport for elderly or disabled people to access food shopping, health facilities or social activities.

Read our glossary of terms and acronyms..