Abstract
The aims of the study of “People With Disabled, Phitsanulok Taxi on Demand Systems” focus on four main components which are; 1) to survey the transportation demand of people with disability and the ability to provide service by the entrepreneur/taxi drivers; 2) to review the regulations and/or the standards of transportation service for disabled people that are represented both in Thailand and in other countries around the world; 3) to analyze and to find the appropriate way to support and assist the taxi service system for people with disability; 4) to design and to experiment the taxi service information system for people with disability.
The study found that
1. Transportation is essential for people with disability. It does not only provide a need purposely for disabled people but also it does reframe the society’s perspective toward disability.
2. Taxi service in Phitsanulok can be able to serve the people with disability in six aspects, which consist of; 1) the indistinguishable feeling of disabled people from ordianary ones when using the taxi service; 2) the assistance for getting into and out from the vehicle; 3) the assistance of taxi driver for lifting the passenger’s belongings; 4) the ability of taxi driver to communicate with the passenger when providing the service; 5) the hospitality and service mind to serve people with disbility; and 6) the ability to assist in case of emergency.
3. The designed information system is called “TODIS: Taxi on Demand Information System”. It purposely aims to represent a user friendly interface and comprehensive information regarding transportation service for disability, which can be viewed in the following links: http://www.wearehappy.sci.nu.ac.th/plk/taxi4dp/ and http://www.wearehappy.sci.nu.ac.th/plk/taxi4dp/taxiservice.html
4. The foundation of taxi service system for people with disability in Phitsanulok is an important key point to consider and it is needed to perform in order to improve the system to be a suitable and functional service in the future. According to the results of the study, it is suggested that; 1) the taxi drivers have to customize their vehicles to suit the disabled person; 2) it is necessary to build the knowledge and attitude of the taxi drivers toward the disabilties; 3) the taxi service is needed to call via the call center service; 4) local administrative organization plays an important role in terms of transportation service for disability due to it has responsibility to improve the wellbeing and quality of life of the disabled people who live in the area of responsibility; and 5) it is necessary to determine the reasonable extra transportation fee for people with disability.
