From A to B

At a time when local authorities face a squeeze on their finances and are repairing a pothole every 33 seconds, our new paper - From A to B - points to the importance of residents' perceptions of road conditions in shaping their overall views of transport and highways services.

This new analysis by Ipsos underlines the importance to local authorities of aligning policies, priorities and communication with what matters to people. We found strong associations between overall public ratings of transport and highways services and some individual service aspects - put simply, some transport and highways services matter more than others in shaping public perceptions.

Ipsos administered the 2009 National Highways and Transport Survey (NHTS) on behalf of the National Highways and Transport Network and 76 English local authorities, and has undertaken further analysis of the large survey dataset.

This analysis points to the importance of residents' perceptions of road and pavement conditions in shaping their overall views of highway condition (with speed of repair an important third-ranked predictor), but public perceptions of road surfaces are substantially more influential than perceptions of pavements.

From A to B also brings together national and local opinion polling on transport issues including data showing transport to be a top-of-mind issue at a local level even if it rarely features as a key national, or electoral, issue.

Our paper provides a statistical basis to priority-setting by local authorities as they prepare for the next round of Local Transport Plans. It is timely because, according to the Local Government Association, councils needed to mend a hole in a road every 33 seconds throughout 2009 and before the recent winter conditions described as the worst for 30 years.

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