Five-year-old Olivia Kouloukis, a student at Century School, turns a cartwheel with friend and schoolmate Annora Madden, 6, Friday afternoon during a school outing at Watson Park. Results of a recent city survey show that Lawrence residents are pleased with Lawrence's parks and recreation facilities and overall quality of life. Residents were less pleased with street and transportation issues.

Lawrence residents are pretty happy, except perhaps when they’re driving.

Those are among major findings in a new $29,000 survey that polled 1,200 Lawrence residents on their feelings about a variety of city services.

In the city survey, which included people from all parts of the community, residents give high marks to the community’s overall quality of life. But they think there’s plenty of room for improvement on almost every transportation-related issue.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” City Commissioner Mike Amyx said of the results. “I think we’re moving in the right direction on streets, but we still have a lot of work to do. I’m the first one to say that there are still plenty of cracks and potholes we have to fill in.

“The public works crews are doing a heck of a job, but the improvements we have to make are really pretty monumental.”

Get Lawrence residents outside their cars, though, and they’re generally a happy bunch, the survey found. Eighty-seven percent of respondents said they were satisfied or very satisfied with quality of life here. That’s better than the 77 percent national average.

Parks and recreation programs play a major role in that quality-of-life satisfaction, according to the survey. All 14 parks and recreation-related issues on the survey produced satisfaction levels of 50 percent or higher.

Topping the list was the parks’ appearance, with an 88 percent satisfaction rating. At the bottom of the list was the quality of Eagle Bend Golf Course at 59 percent satisfaction. Other key parks and recreation findings were: 77 percent satisfied with the number of parks and 66 percent satisfied with availability of youth fields.

City Manager David Corliss said the quality-of-life findings were gratifying.

“There is definitely satisfaction in hearing that,” he said. “But we’re not doing this so we can win an award. We want to continuously improve this organization.”