Integrating Land Use with Public Transport: The Use of a Discursive Accessibility Tool to Inform Metropolitan Spatial Planning in Perth

Abstract

Traditional transport modelling tools have not been used to enable planners to assess the extent to which future metropolitan growth options achieve sustainable accessibility through land use transport integration (LUTI). Further, both the characteristics and use of traditional tools limit the opportunity for stakeholders to participate in an explorative, open‐ended decision‐making process. The paper reports on how a new accessibility assessment tool, designed to overcome these problems, was employed with planning and transport practitioners to enable informed choices between scenarios for future change to Perth’s metropolitan spatial structure and public transport network. It was found that the tool provided measurements for public transport accessibility where previously there were none. More importantly practitioners’ understanding about LUTI was enhanced, particularly by showing the relationships between transport network accessibility and the accessibility of ‘place’.