For the second year running, Centre for Cities and Arup have conducted an annual survey asking the elected leaders of the UK’s largest urban areas about their ambitions and frustrations on issues such as transport, housing and the climate emergency.

The UK city leaders' survey 2019 shows climate change and transport as emerging priorities. Climate change and transport is at the forefront of CIHT members' work which are rising items on city leaders' agendas. This highlights the importance of the sector in addressing crucial challenges affecting residents and businesses in UK cities. 

Throughout the survey, leaders identified climate change mitigation and air pollution as pressing challenges, and eight in ten would allocate more money to it if given the choice. Almost every respondent (94 per cent) chose to allocate money to public transport in a hypothetical grant and 41 per cent of respondents stated that they were encouraging bus travel to improve air quality.

Modal shift is a top transport priority for city leaders. 63 per cent of this year’s leaders put switching from car to public transport or active travel as a priority. In line with overall policy priorities, this highlights that zero-carbon active travel and lower carbon public transport are of high importance for this year’s respondents.

In addition, buses grew in importance compared to last year. While less than one-third of last year’s respondents mentioned buses as a priority, almost half (47 per cent) of this year’s respondents did so.

Despite the strong focus on public transport, 44 per cent of this year’s respondents stated that road connections to other cities are a priority to them. But while half of respondents last year identified roads within the city as a priority, less than one in five of this year’s respondents did. Read the full publication below.

Andrew Hugill, CIHT’s Director of Policy and Technical Affairs said:

“This survey, from a key group of leaders, highlights the importance of the work CIHT members do – the findings about climate change and the need to move to sustainable transport is an importance focus for CIHT as part of our pledge”

Urban Voices: UK City Leaders’ Survey 2019