This synthesis covers a wide range of policies and practices that transit agencies use to provide service to persons with disabilities more effectively and more efficiently. As demand for paratransit continues to increase in many communities, transit agencies are looking for innovative ways to serve the individuals who must use paratransit, while also operating more efficiently to contain costs and/or provide more service for the available resources. Information is presented here for transit agency managers and paratransit managers and their staffs, as well as other professionals involved in paratransit service delivery. This synthesis highlights policies and practices that transit agencies would be able to apply to their own services, often without the need to devote significant funds, personnel, or other resources. It also identifies certain practices and technologies that are still under development or have not undergone extensive testing. They merit discussion because they seem to offer great potential. This synthesis includes a literature review that provides a baseline of information studies, of particular value in representing definitive studies in their respective areas and/or bringing together much information in a single source. It documents 124 transit agency responses to a selected survey effort and summarizes the findings from 17 transit agency telephone interviews where staff provided further details about certain policies and practices that they believed to be innovative and/or potentially useful to others. (Author/publisher).
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