WYOMING — The Wyoming Department of Transportation (WYDOT) recently received its “bi-annual report card,” the results of a Customer Satisfaction Survey conducted by the University of Wyoming’s Survey and Analysis Center.
The telephone survey, which gathers answers from adults across Wyoming, has been conducted every two years since 2002. This year, the survey found a 78.3% overall satisfaction with stewardship of the state’s transportation system. The survey also found that 81.5% were satisfied with road improvements.
“We’re always trying to strive to be better and good feedback from the public is important for our opportunity to be successful in providing that high level of customer satisfaction,” said WYDOT Director Darin Westby.
As anticipated by WYDOT, satisfaction with road quality dipped slightly this year, as did overall satisfaction with maintenance and road plowing. The survey found that 42.1% agreed that state highways have improved in the past two years, 59% were satisfied with the maintenance of highways and 62.4% agreed that roads were plowed promptly.
Westby attributed this dip to staffing capacity issues.
“We don’t have as many people who are able to get out there and plow the snow, [or] fix the potholes,” said Westby. “We also don’t have the budget to put into reconstruction [because] over the last 10 years we’ve been in preservation mode.”
One area of notable increase was the public’s use of WYDOT’s travel information services.
“People are really taking an opportunity before they go out and travel to investigate what they are going to be getting into. I think that just goes towards making a safer public and more informed public,” said Westby.
In terms of customer services, both driver services and patrol continue to rate well with the public. Driver services showed an 84.5% satisfaction rate, 86% said that highway patrol met their expectations with contact and 78% said that highway patrol met their expectations with no contact.
“The troopers scored high, but even higher after they had contact with a citizen,” said Colonel Timothy Cameron with the Wyoming Highway Patrol. “[This] indicates that law enforcement does their job and that our training is appropriate, relevant and specific to service to ours citizens.”
The full survey results are available on WYDOT’s website under “News and Contact Information.”
