City hospitals have received the highest marks while road maintenance and sports facilities scored low in a citizen satisfaction survey for city services, city officials said Monday.

According to the annual poll by the Seoul Metropolitan Government, city hospitals received the highest score of 86.1, thanks to staff kindness, clean facilities and convenience.

Road and sports facility maintenance scored 57.5 and 56.6 points for lack of safety and accessibility, respetively.

Most of the sports facilities were also regarded as outdated and overcrowded.

The survey asked about 20,000 citizens from September to November last year to rate the quality of city services in the field of hospitals, civil complaint services, childcare centers, water, parks, libraries, roads and sports facilities, all run by the city government.

“The city government needs to come up with measures to improve city services that meet citizens’ expectations,” said Choi Byoung-dae, professor at Hanyang University who led the survey.

“They have to focus on improving the quality of roads and sports facilities.”

Civil complaint services showed a steady increase in the satisfaction survey over the past five years as its score jumped by 16.7 from 2006 to 81 today.

The city attributes the quick solution to inconveniences citizens experience with city government works to the improvement in civil servants’ kind attitudes and the effectiveness of their help as well as the 120 call center operations launched in 2009.

Childcare centers run by the municipality came third in the satisfaction survey, scoring high in food and nutrition.

Water quality and city parks were fourth and fifth. Water quality was the only field where the rating dropped by 0.1 point to 74.9 this year due to the fare charge and meter reading.

City parks showed the biggest jump in the light of improved environment and landscape, while its safety and accessibility were found to need improvement.

By Lee Woo-young  (wylee@heraldcorp.com)