Indicator 31: Public awareness and behaviour

The Convention on access to information, public participation in decision-making and access to justice in environmental matters (ECE/CEP/43) aims at promoting environmental education and awareness among the public through the provision of environmental information.

Improving the environmental performance of the sector requires a shift of individual behaviour towards more environment-friendly patterns. Individual travel behaviour is embedded in specific technical-social-organisational networks that can make alternative patterns of behaviour difficult to accept. Understanding how individuals’ travel demand is generated within these networks can help highlight specific pressure points where change is more easily brought about. Different social groups have different attitudes towards transport behaviour, and educational level and financial status play important roles in determining travel behaviour (OECD/GD(97)1).

Eurobarometer polls are carried out every few years at the request of DG Environment. Results from recent polls are shown in Figure 7.2.

Figure 7.2: Reasons for complaining about one's local environment, poll results (% with ‘very much/quite a lot reason to complain)

Source: (CEC, 1999b)

The transport-related problems are the amount of traffic, air pollution (40 %) and, to a lesser extent, damage to the landscape and noise. This is confirmed by findings of surveys in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Norway and Switzerland.

Complaints about the local environment are less frequent in Sweden, Ireland, the Netherlands, Finland and Denmark, and more frequent in Italy, Spain and Greece (1995 Eurobarometer poll results)

Future priorities may include:

• establishment of a consistent methodology to enable this indicator to show differences in public awareness in Member States and relative changes in the EU with time;
• inclusion of more specific questions on transport and the environment in Eurobarometer;
• surveys to be conducted specifically for TERM on a periodic basis;

Future work should also attempt to provide information and data on public awareness and patterns of transport behaviour of different social groups.