A COMPREHENSIVE strategy to bring transport to the disabled and people in rural areas has been compiled.

North Yorkshire County Council, the Countryside Agency, Hambleton and Richmondshire Primary Care Trust and Ripon Council for Voluntary Services have worked on the document.

It aims to make sure that community transport is available to everyone who needs it.

It is the first time that such a strategy has been put together and it recommends that a number of measures be implemented over the next ten years at a cost of between £300,000 and £400,000.

These include the various stakeholders putting together a financial support package and setting up four community transport co-ordination centres.

Lucy Beadle, project officer for the council's passenger transport group, said: "Community transport is transport that is organised on a voluntary basis and delivered by not-for-profit organisations, rather than transport provided by commercial operators on a profit-making basis.

"It is generally aimed at those who cannot access conventional transport, either because they are disabled or because they live in a deep rural area.

"The county does not have a strategy for such schemes, but recognises the benefit that a lot of these organisations can have in providing transport.

"The strategy really just is an attempt to identify what is there, make us aware of what is happening and possibly divert some funding their way.

"It is really just to pull everything together so we can make best use of the funds.

"As much as the county council and Countryside Agency have commissioned this study, it is a strategy for North Yorkshire, not for North Yorkshire County Council. We are looking to get funding from the primary care trusts and the district councils and possibly eventually from the Ambulance Service."

The council's executive will discuss the strategy at a meeting next Monday.

If it is approved by councillors, work on implementing the various proposals could start by April next year.