Scaling Innovation Funding Programme - National Centre for Accessible Transport

Introduction

Scaling Innovation is part of the National Centre for Accessible Transport’s seven-year programme, funded by the Motability Foundation. It supports entrepreneurs, small and medium-sized enterprises, charities, Disabled People’s Organisations, researchers and transport innovators to develop practical products and services that tackle evidence-based accessibility challenges across the United Kingdom’s transport network.

By combining funding with research, lived experience and specialist expertise, the programme helps accelerate innovations that remove transport barriers and create a more accessible transport system.

Delivered with consortium partner CPC, the Scaling Innovation Programme combines funding with technical, commercial, and sector expertise to support the development accessible transport solutions from concept through to delivery and live trials.

Innovative solutions for transport accessibility

Projects supported through the programme explore a wide range of accessibility challenges across transport, including journey planning, passenger information, wayfinding, infrastructure, customer experience, mobility services and emerging technologies.

From idea to impact

The programme supports innovation at different stages of development, from early ideas and prototypes through to testing, live environments and scalable solutions. By connecting innovators with transport and industry experts and disabled people with lived experience, projects are designed to respond to real accessibility challenges in the UK’s transport network.

Transport innovation informed by disabled people

Disabled people are involved throughout the Scaling Innovation Programme, from concept development and design through to testing, refinement and future implementation.

Using a social model approach, innovators work alongside people with lived experience to identify barriers, shape design decisions and test solutions in real-world settings. This ongoing collaboration helps ensure innovations respond to the barriers created by the transport system and reflect the experiences of the people who will use them.

By embedding lived experience throughout the innovation process, projects are better placed to develop practical, inclusive solutions that can support more accessible transport.

The Innovators

Explore how innovators from across the United Kingdom are co-creating, testing and scaling solutions to remove transport barriers and drive long-term systemic change.

Scaling Innovation 1

The first round of the Scaling Innovation programme supported 12 organisations to develop and test innovative solutions through two challenge areas; Physical Barriers in the Street and Interactions with Other People, as well as an Open Call.

Click on the orange wheel shape here on the right to link to the SCALING INNOVATION 1 CASE STUDIES page

an image combining the logos of the National Centre for Accessible Transport, which is black initials on a white background, sat alongside an orange wheel shape, as well as the words Connected Places Catapult in green, sat above the words Scaling Innovation. Below it is a group picture of 34 people standing or sitting in front of a wall with a window behind all facing the camera and smiling

Scaling Innovation 2 cohort

Explore how innovators from across the United Kingdom are co-creating, testing and scaling solutions to remove transport barriers and drive long-term systemic change.

To read more about the innovators click on the image on the left to view the news item for the programme launch.

Funded by the Motability Foundation

The Scaling Innovation Programme is made possible through funding from the Motability Foundation as part of its investment in the National Centre for Accessible Transport. By supporting innovation informed by evidence and lived experience, the programme helps accelerate practical solutions that can improve accessibility across the United Kingdom’s transport network.