Research, Development and Evaluation Commission

72% Satisfied With the Overall Walking Environment

According to the poll conducted in March 2021 by The Research, Development and Evaluation Commission (RDEC) of Taipei City Government, 72% of the respondents were satisfied with the overall walking environment in Taipei City and 23% were dissatisfied. The top three reasons (without prompted options and multiple choices) for dissatisfaction were automobile violations on the pedestrian sidewalk including illegal parking, uneven pavement, and vehicles and pedestrians competing for roadways.  Sixty-five percent of the interviewee were satisfied with the sidewalks in Taipei City and 71% were satisfied with the sidewalks near their residences which was 10 to 20 percent higher than the previous poll conducted in April of 2016.  However, about 30% of the interviewees were dissatisfied with the sidewalks near their residences.  The top three complaints (with prompted options and multiple choices) were too many obstructions in the road, uneven pavement, and broken concrete sidewalk bricks.  In general, the negative reactions across-the-board had decreased.

86% Believe Drivers in Taipei City Will Yield to Pedestrians

With regard to pedestrian safety issues, 81% of the respondents often or sometimes encountered pedestrians crossing the road while looking at their mobile phones.  Fifty-five percent often or sometimes encountered bicycles riding on the sidewalks.  Eighty-six percent said that drivers would yield to pedestrians most of the time.  Seventy-nine percent of the respondents had ever seen the marked sidewalk.  Among the 992 who had ever seen it, 70% were satisfied with the measure, while 25% were not.  People who walk have a relatively higher satisfaction rate.  When asking the reasons of satisfaction and dissatisfaction respectively (without prompted options and single choice), the main reason of satisfaction is people feeling safer walking on the sidewalk exclusively for pedestrian, and the reasons with a dissatisfaction ratio of more than 10% include vehicles driving on it, not having enough physical separation to protect, no easy to walk uneven pavement, not wide enough to walk on marked sidewalk, and illegal parking.

11% Have Used Car or Motorcycle Sharing Services

With regard to car and motorcycle sharing issues, 57% of the respondents knew about vehicle sharing/sharing service in Taipei City.  Among the 715 people who knew about the car renting/sharing service, 20% had used the service before and 80% had not used it.  If converted to all the respondents, 11% of them had used the service.  For those who had used the service, 69% support the service, while 12% do not and 18% have no opinion or don’t know.   When asking supporters and non-supporters their reasons respectively (without prompted options and single choice), the two main reasons to support the service were the convenience of renting and returning, and not having to buy and to maintain a car.  On the other hand, the reasons not to support were the compression of the car and motorcycle parking spaces, car abuse such as illegally parking and not caring for rented vehicles, and causing road usage problems such as traffic jams.

Background Information of the Poll

The poll was conducted between March 29 and April 1 of 2021 and successfully interviewed 1254 people living in Taipei City and aged 18 or above (933 people refused to participate). The margin of sampling error is under ±2.77 percent at the 95% confidence interval.  The telephone numbers are randomly selected from Taipei City residential numbers. The responses are weighted by age, gender and household registration.