Ministry conducts survey on houses, public places

Manama, May 10 (BNA): Roads Planning and Design Director at the Ministry of Works, Municipalities Affairs and Urban Planning Kadhim Abdullatif stated that the Ministry has commenced phase 2 of a field survey and personal interviews by conducting a survey on housing units in order to put in place a traffic model extending to year 2040. The traffic model is to reflect the Kingdom’s vision and act like a reference for future transport development projects. He explained that interviews will take place with 3000 families in their homes, where they will be asked general questions about the social and economic characteristics of the family and the nature of their trips and movement during study and working days. This aims to predict future movement and trip patterns and thus plan transport infrastructure for the roads network and the public transportation and transport policies that are needed to create a sustainable development. Also, Abdullatif added that the team to conduct the survey will be provided with introductive cards that are signed and stamped with the Ministry’s stamp and a letter from the Ministry to facilitate their assignment. Citizens and residents are urged to check the documents that they will supply to the team before the interview. All data are treated as confidential and are used for project purposes only. Data do not include names or CPR numbers and thus cannot be linked to certain persons. According to Abdullatif, 100.000 interviews will be held with road users in 65 locations and 20 attraction points. More than 3500 interview will also be made with users of public transportation, in addition to traffic restriction works to limit the number of vehicles using the road, surveys on goods traffic to provide the needed data for creating a transport model. A trained team of around 200 people appointed by the International French Consultation Company Egis will conduct the survey. He explained that modern research techniques will be used to create the model in its new version, with different statistical methods such as surveys on the side of the road, home surveys, automatic traffic restriction, traffic restriction on intersections, vehicle load, public transport surveys, truck surveys and analysis of trip duration. Researchers have been trained to conduct the surveys speedily and efficiently without causing any traffic disturbance and delay to road users. The survey will extend throughout May. Interviews aim to collect information on trip characteristics in Bahrain and then come up with a vision on trip size and distribution, therefore plan and evaluate future needs for land transportation.