How much do you love living in Mountain Brook? According to a recent citizen survey, the answer is, “A lot!”
The city does a survey about every three years, which focuses on all aspects of city services, and I could not be more proud of the results of our most recent survey.
ETC Institute does similar municipal surveys across the country and their representative, while presenting results to the city council, said we are a national leader. Here are a few of the highlights:
An amazing 100% of those surveyed rated Mountain Brook as an excellent/good place to live, and 99% rated our city as an excellent/good place to raise children. Ninety-seven percent agreed that our schools were an excellent/good place to educate their children. No surprise there! Our schools continue to score among the nation’s best.
Ninety-nine percent are satisfied with the overall quality of life in the city. We scored higher than the national average in each of the 43 categories measured and “significantly” higher in 42 out of 43 of those categories.
When asked about satisfaction with our city leaders, we scored 84% … where the national average is 39%. The city employees, city council and mayor’s office have worked especially hard to improve communications with our residents, and I am happy to say our survey indicated an overall satisfaction rating of 90%. Our public safety, library and customer service continues to shine with satisfaction ratings of 90% or higher. Parks and Rec as well as Public Works continue to score well with our residents.
The one area of main concern was (again) traffic flow and congestion (parking), where we scored 65% very satisfied/satisfied. In the past, we attempted to address parking and traffic by experimenting with a free transportation system where you could park your car at one of several locations and hop on a bus that circulated between our three main villages every 15 minutes, so there was minimal waiting time. This experiment ran for six-plus months but was very poorly accepted. In Mountain Brook Village, we will be installing two roundabouts, which should significantly help traffic flow (once everyone gets used to the concept!). Parking continues to be an issue, particularly during the lunch hour. We have reinforced with our business owners the need/requirement for employees to park in designated employee parking areas. Regardless, parking is a challenge and if you have a suggestion, we’d love to hear from you!
Survey aside, all of us at the city believe in continuous improvement and welcome your input and suggestions.
