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52 Orange County Comprehensive Parks and Recreation Master Plan CHAPTER 6-Community Needs Assessment and Public Input 6 In looking at the sum total of all surveys received in A strong majority of the cumulative respondents like Table 1, one of the most striking things about the the quality of existing facilities, agree that more ac- responses is that the respondents in the SRS, online tive and low-impact facilities are needed, and and targeted surveys are all fairly similar in their believe in an expanded trail system linking various view of County facilities, programs and value. This is areas of the county. Support for indoor facilities for particularly noteworthy as the online survey is a arts and leisure and athletics is not as strong, but younger, more Hillsborough and rural Orange still a majority. Respondents gave very high marks County located cohort., whereas the SRS survey has for safety, maintenance, access and friendliness of a high response from urban southern Orange Coun- staff (94% Agree/Strongly Agree). The vast majority ty, and is older in general. The SRS survey answers of all respondents believe that parks and recreation to each question range around 5-7percentage points programs enhance the economic health of the coun- higher in the agree/strongly agree category than the ty, enhance physical and mental well-being and (to online survey. (Please see Appendix 7-3 and 7-4 to slightly lesser degree) reduce crime. compare the two survey results). The number of C. Recreation Activity Participation "Don't Know" responses is listed in the final column, In this case, over half (58%) of respondents identi- and in parentheses the number of those that came fied athletic leagues or programs they had from the SRS survey is shown. As can be seen, in participated in during the previous year. Most of many cases the vast majority of persons answering „ these were respondents to the online survey. Con- Don t Know were in the SRS survey, which further siderably fewer persons in the SRS survey had expe- validates the previous note about respondents in rience participating in a County recreation program these areas being less familiar with County facilities in the ear.ast The most and programs since they include a majority of p y popular programs by participation in the past 12 months were: respondents from the towns of Chapel Hill and Carrboro. 1. Youth Soccer(35%) In summary, the combined survey results shown 2. Youth Basketball (30%) here track with most of the "Agree/Disagree" 3. Open Gym (9%) aggregate response rates from the other individual 4. Little River Trail Run (6%) surveys. Online survey participants were somewhat 5. Volleyball(5%) more interested in expanding active outdoor Most popular instructional programs in the online recreation opportunities and were also slightly less survey were Start Smart Soccer, Zumba, Tennis certain about a trail system linking various areas of (both adult and youth), Golf (youth and adult) and the county. However, the rate of"Agree" responses Creative Arts. The full list and breakdown of partici- stayed fairly consistent between the surveys. pants may be found in Appendix 6-6. The most popular environmental programs were the County's Earth Day event (34%), followed by Under the Stars (17%) and Tiny Trekkers (17%) programs at t Little River Regional Park and Natural Area.The Little River Park Bird Counts also received 11% of the _ r votes. In response to the question "How often do '+ you or members of your household travel outside of _ Orange County to participate in recreation pro- grams," 471 respondents (62.4%) indicated they never traveled outside of the county for programs. 6-6