Assessment of the Quality of Urban Transport Services in Nigeria

Transport services are inadequate in quality and qualitative terms in most developing countries such as Nigeria which, relies on the importation of fairly used vehicles to meet the travel demands. The poor service delivery of transport system had created impediment towards the smooth movement of people, goods and services in some of urban centres in Nigeria. This study is designed to investigate the quality of transport services in Ibadan metropolis. The study area covered the eleven local government areas that make up Ibadan metropolis. Stratified sampling technique was used to select two political wards from each of the local government areas identified in the city. The twenty two political wards sampled were re-grouped into three geographical areas based on land use characteristics and population density. These are high, medium and low density. In each of the three geographical areas identified in the city, a systematic random sampling procedure was employed to select one in every twenty buildings along the major streets. In each of the buildings sampled, only one household is randomly selected for interview. An average of one hundred copies of the questionnaire was administered in each of the density area. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data. The findings revealed that some of the urban residents who are less accessible to transport services in their neighborhood commute on foot to meet their travel demands. Many of the urban residents expressed their dissatisfaction with the transport services available in the city. Further analysis showed that household’s income is highly correlated with modal choice in the city. The result of the analysis further revealed that some of the intra-transport services are poorly maintained. The study concluded that there is need to revitalize the transport services in urban centres in Nigeria so as to improve the accessibility characteristics of urban residents and promote sustainable transport development.