Two of our most recent interns wrap up their time with us here at Western Gateway, as they complete an impressive piece of work on transport inequality across the Western Gateway region. Henry Thorner and Sophie Sparkes are both university students who joined the team from University of the West of England. Together, they created an index of transport accessibility challenges, which directly feeds into the important work of our emerging Strategic Investment Plan (SIP) refresh.
The project involved using GIS mapping and data analysis, and a Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) process, where 9 protected characteristics, determined under the Equality Act 2010, were carefully weighted and ranked.
Skills learned included:
- QGIS fundamentals: project initiation, data importation, data amalgamation, data presentation
- Excel improvements: multi-stage instructions advanced pasting functions, data weighting, independent decision making for data work.
- Understanding Transport Governance: Understanding of the strengths and limitations of the current sub-national transport body model and the procedures that have to be undertaken to create/modify transport systems in the region and beyond.
- Financial Processes: Understanding of the financial processes and how their project connects to the SIP and the future of regional transport.
- Appraisal and Vision-Led Planning: Understanding of the logic and reasoning behind Cost-benefit Analysis and the procedures of the future (Vision Led).
Both Henry and Sophie also got to experience an office environment – which they described as ‘not scary!’.
Sophie said: “Using the findings from our study to help address transport inequality within the region has been so rewarding, reinforcing my aspiration to contribute to community-focused, accessible, and sustainable approaches within my future career.”
Henry said: “I can be confident that I will be able to find my place in the ever-changing job market as I am now better integrated with the practise of local and regional transport policy than many of my peers.”
