Understanding perspectives on policy change: The case of dogs on public transport in Sydney, Australia

Abstract

Modern life requires increasingly complex and diverse travel behavior. We attend multiple destinations for multiple purposes, and trips are chained together as households negotiate the demands and opportunities presented by cities. To compete with the autonomy and flexibility of the private car, a successful public transport system should accommodate this complexity. Drawing from a series of data sources, this paper applies a discourse analysis to examine perspectives on the implementation of a public transport policy designed to accommodate one specific, but surprisingly common, user need: travel with dogs. In 2015, A bespoke survey of 1250 dog-owners in Sydney, Australia revealed a high level of car use for dog-related trips. This reflects, in part, the fact that dogs are prohibited on the public transport network in the case study city. Recognizing that any change to this policy requires an evidence base of community sentiment, a further survey (n = 1091) of both dog and non-dog owners was conducted in 2017 to assess attitudes to dogs on public transport. Over 20 percent of the representative sample opposed apolicy change. In 2019, a discourse analysis was conducted on 163 comments to an article on dogs on public transport published on the academic news site, The Conversation. Several themes emerged, extending from concerns about cleanliness, to a basic distrust of dog owners. These three data sources, in combination, establish both the need for change and the nature of resistance to change, revealing the complexity of advocating for potentially positive developments in transport policy.

Keywords:

• Australia
• automobility
• discourse analysis
• dogs
• public transport

Acknowledgement

The authors are grateful for the detailed comments provided by reviewers who have helped to clarify a number of issues in the paper. Any remaining errors are the responsibility of the authors.

Disclosure statement

The authors confirm that no financial interest or benefit has arisen from the direct applications of this research.

Additional information

Funding

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.