TRANSPORT SURVEYS: RAISING THE STANDARD. ORGANIZATION AND OVERALL RESULTS OF THE CONFERENCE

This conference on transport surveys attracted a wide international audience of about 135 experts from government, market research agencies, academe and professional bodies. At least 25 countries were represented by the delegates. The conference involved intensive workshop sessions over a 6-day period, providing ample opportunity for participants to learn from each other, to debate best practice and how to define and raise standards, and to make contacts that will aid professional exchange into the future. The conference length and format enabled many communication barriers to be removed and will have a long-term benefit in terms of increasing dialogue and understanding. One of the key aims of the conference was to produce a short but comprehensive set of guidelines to assist those who commission, conduct, analyze or interpret findings from transport surveys. These were prepared in outline form in advance of the conference, and each workshop contributed in its specialist area. This conference summary discusses the conference achievements and outlines the main issues, findings and conclusions from some of the conference sessions.