"God, whatever you do, don't tell people it's unsafe": Public transport service providers' perspectives on women's safety from sexual violence on public transport

In Australia, one in two women have experienced sexual harassment in their lifetime and one in five women has experienced sexual violence since the age of 15. Public facing organizations, such as public transport providers, have a role to play in providing safe environments and preventing violence. Our study examined the experiences and views of those working in public transport delivery organizations about the organizational challenges and opportunities to provide safe transport for women. Using Normalization Process Theory (NPT), our analysis of 19 semi-structured in-depth interviews with stakeholders focused on three key areas: making sense of safety of women on public transport; working towards women's safety on public transport; and monitoring the progress of safety initiatives. We found that public transport is delivered by multiple stakeholders, with individual and combined organizational and relational complexity. Participants highlighted the importance of leadership and the need for an overarching strategy for women's safety. Macro-level organizational and environmental barriers to implementing safety initiatives include a lack of proactive, consistent, and collaborative approaches. Differing understandings of what women's safety means can lead to conflicting strategies among organizations, but there are opportunities to develop and integrate enhanced and conceptually consistent training and policies in response to women's safety. At the micro-level, providers recognize the need to prioritize safety for women across public transport. Our findings indicate key opportunities to inform the development of interventions and policies for public transport, and public facing organizations more broadly, to provide for and sustain women's safety.