Efforts to bring together small, independent providers of specialised transportation services to increase efficiency have been made for more than 20 years. Consolidation and co-ordination are two methods that have been attempted. The results are mixed. Sometimes consolidation and co-ordination fail because of political reasons, sometimes they are implemented but fail to provide improvements. Politicians are attracted to consolidation in theory but resist it if their jobs are affected. A third method, unification, was studied recently in Central Contra Costa County, California. specialised transportation providers were placed under a common management umbrella. Management was consolidated but service was not. Unification is attractive because it is less of a threat to stakeholders, yet it provides the management structure necessary for accomplishing the specific changes that are hoped for under consolidation and co-ordination. The unified system discussed here is a type of brokerage system providing flexibility for multiple providers and service competition. How the concept of unification was developed, presented, and implemented in Central Contra Costa County is discussed in this paper.
Abstract