1. National Travel Survey
Maureen Delamere
Statistician –
QNHS Analysis and Social Modules
Central Statistics Office

3. National Travel Survey (NTS)
Module of QNHS
Quarter , 2012, 2013 and 2014
On travel behaviour of respondents
One of most comprehensive household studies of travel patterns ever to be conducted within the State
In 2014, detailed information on travel collected from 10,382 respondents comprising 18,031 journeys

4. NTS continued CAPI interviewing – on waves 2 to 4 of QNHS sample
The information collected included the following:
number of journeys made
reason for journey
mode of transport used
duration of each journey
distance travelled
Only travel within the island of Ireland, made by residents of the State

5. NTS continued
2011 Census of Population POWCAR (Place Of Work Census of Anonymised Records)
POWCAR - definitive source of data on travel to work, school and college
NTS results – are for a particular quarter - may not be fully representative of the year as a whole
Care should be taken when interpreting the results, especially if extrapolating to annualised results
Also seasonality note of caution

6. NTS – key definitions and descriptions
Journey – one way course of travel from A toB for the purpose of carrying out a specific activity at location B. Location could be a single premise or a complex of premises
Return trips recorded as separate journeys
Journeys must have:
Commenced in the travel reference day (but may end the following day)
Been at least 100 metres in length (approx one minute walk)
Comprised exclusively of domestic travel (all stages of foreign travel were excluded)
Not an integral part of respondent’s routine employment
Mode - where a journey consists of more than one mode of travel, the main mode of travel is the mode of travel used for greatest distance
Travel reference period is 4am to 3:59am – allows capture of information for respondents who finish work or return from leisure activities after midnight
Data collected over 24 hour period

7. NTS – key definitions and descriptions (continued)
Travel Reference Day
To ensure that data is collected for all 7 days of the week, each participant in the NTS is assigned a selected 'travel reference day ‘- maximum of three days prior to the day of interview
Wednesday through to Saturday interviews - travel reference day was the immediately preceding day
Monday interviews - .30% of Monday interviews were assigned at random to the immediately preceding Friday, 42% to the immediately preceding Saturday and 28% to the immediately preceding Sunday.
Tuesday interviews- 17% were assigned at random to the immediately preceding Sunday and 83% were assigned to the immediately preceding Monday Excluded the business related travel of professional drivers (e.g. bus and taxi drivers) and other occupations where travel is integral to the role (e.g. postal delivery workers)
NTS journey purpose of 'work' includes both commuter and business travel
Excludes the business related travel of professional drivers (e.g. bus and taxi drivers) and other occupations where travel is integral to the role (e.g. postal delivery workers)

8. Users of NTS Data
Used to compile statistical indicators for journey purpose and modes of travel
Universally accepted necessity for better transport data to underpin transport policy making and monitoring of key programmes, including Smarter Travel
Help monitor implementation of existing transport policy and will inform future transport initiatives
With regular surveys any shifts will be detected earlier and allow policy approaches to be more responsive in future
Measure of demand for personal transport within the State
Spending on Transport in 2014 was €1.1 billion

9. Percentage of persons who travelled on the travel reference day

10. Percentage of persons who travelled by region (NUTS3)

11. Percentage distribution of journeys by purpose

12. Percentage distribution of journeys by time of departure

13. Percentage distribution of journeys by duration

14. Percentage distribution of journeys by journey distance

15. Percentage distribution of journeys by mode of travel and degree of urbanisation

16. Percentage distribution of journeys by mode of travel

17. All regions excluding Dublin
Mode of travel Percentage distribution of journeys by mode of travel 2014
Dublin region
All regions excluding Dublin

20. Those who did not travel

21. Those who did travel – by travel group size

29. Future of NTS Next survey – Quarter 4 2016 No change basis
Household Survey Development Project – transformation programme for QNHS
CSO - meet user demand for travel data while simultaneously reducing the response burden, minimising the required inputs
Does the change being captured by the survey necessitate an annual survey?

30. Thank you for your time
Any questions?