Information for participating households
Table of contents
- Why is it important that you participate?
- How did we select you?
- What is the process of being surveyed?
- Why do we send out reminders?
- Which members of your household will be surveyed?
- What information will you be asked to provide?
- Which trips are important for the survey?
- Where can you get support?
- How do we protect your data?
- When will the results be published?
- Where can you find further information?
Why is it important that you participate?
The goal of transport and mobility planning is to enable all population groups to participate in society. Therefore, it is important to know the mobility needs of all people. This is only possible if as many people as possible participate in this kind of survey and provide information about their mobility behaviour.
Therefore, it is necessary for people to participate in the survey, even if they, for example:
- only leave the house occasionally or not at all
- make only short trips
- do not have a car
- were not in their home city on the reporting day.
People with limited mobility are also explicitly asked to take part in the survey.
How did we select you?
Since it is not possible to survey the entire population, a selected part of the population is surveyed on behalf of all residents.
The addresses of the persons are drawn at random from the population registers of the cities and municipalities. There are no restrictions regarding age, nationality, main or secondary residence. The households are contacted on the basis of these addresses.
As a result of the random selection, it is not unusual that, for example, neighbors of a selected person do not receive the survey documents.
What is the process of being surveyed?
All selected households receive an official announcement letter. This informs them about the purpose of the survey and asks for the participation of all household members. The letter also includes a privacy statement.
Households to which the survey institute was able to determine a telephone number from public telephone directories will learn the assigned reporting day from the announcement letter. After the reporting day, they are called and asked about their household, the people living in it, and their trips. These households can also participate online at www.srv2023.de and enter their information there.
Households of which the survey institute was unable to determine a telephone number are first sent a short questionnaire, which also asks for a telephone number or e-mail address. After returning the questionnaire, these households will receive another letter informing them of their reporting day. If households have provided a telephone number, they will be called and interviewed after the reporting day. Alternatively, they have the option to participate online at www.srv2023.de.
For both the telephone and online interviews, participating individuals can refer to a travel diary where they have noted their trips on the reporting day to remember them.
Why do we send out reminders?
There are various reasons why selected individuals do not respond to the request to return the short questionnaire. These include that the survey documents have been misplaced or forgotten. Therefore, you will receive a maximum of two reminders.
Nevertheless, participation in the survey is, of course, voluntary. The survey institute will not contact you after the second reminder and will delete your data. If you do not wish to participate, please ignore these reminders.
The reminders are sent automatically. If they overlap with the arrival or collection of your response, you may still have received a reminder even though your response was already on its way or recently arrived. In this case, you do not need to take any further action.
Which members of your household will be surveyed?
Of every household contacted, all members who live and manage the household together are surveyed. Individuals who did not leave the house on the reporting day are also expressly asked to participate in the survey.
It is equally important that children are surveyed, but this is always done through their legal guardians.
What information will you be asked to provide?
Information is requested about the household and the household members. This includes, for example, the number of cars owned by the household and the frequency of public transport use. In addition, information on the trips made by all household members on a given reporting day is particularly important.
Which trips are important for the survey?
All trips made on the specified reporting day are important. This also includes walks, trips home, return trips, walks and short trips (e.g., taking a letter to the mailbox, going to the bakery). This also applies to trips that took place after midnight.
A trip is always linked to a specific purpose or destination (e.g. work, shopping, leisure) (example: from home to work, then to lunch, back to work, then from work to shopping and then home = 5 trips).
The trips there and back are always two different trips.
If you use several means of transport or change, this remains one trip (example: walk from the cinema to the bus stop, take the bus home and then walk the rest of your way home = 1 trip).
Round trips, meaning trips with the same starting point and destination (e.g., walk, bike ride, walk the dog) are also two different trips. The first half of the trip (trip 1) has the corresponding trip purpose (e.g., leisure), and the second half of the round trip (trip 2) has the purpose of the starting point (e.g., going home or to work).
Where can you get support?
If you have any questions or need assistance, please contact the survey institute O.trend. This is how you can reach them:
- free telephone hotline 0800 830 1 830
- e-mail address
- webchat and contact form at www.srv2023.de
How do we protect your data?
It is assured that both the Technische Universität Dresden and the appointed survey institute O.trend comply with the relevant data protection regulations. All individuals involved in the survey have committed themselves in writing to comply with these regulations. Compliance with the data protection regulations will be monitored.
After the survey, your address and your information will be separated.
Your address and telephone number remain under seal. They will be deleted as soon as all answers from your household have been recorded completely and without errors, at the latest at the end of the survey.
Your information is converted into numbers and transferred to a data storage device (e.g. a hard drive) without your name, address or destination addresses (this means it is anonymized). After the data is anonymized in this way, it is impossible to make any connections to you.
When will the results be published?
The city-specific results will first be made available to the commissioning institutions in November 2024. They will then take over the further publication on their own.
City-independent results, e.g. on groups of participating cities and overarching development trends, will be published by TU Dresden. For the last two survey rounds, these are available for download on the SrV 2018 and SrV 2013 results pages.
Where can you find further information?
At www.srv2023.de you will find further information on the project background and data protection, an FAQ section and the registration window for the online questionnaire (for households selected to participate).