Access to Services - Health

This analysis of access to services was developed for the report, Availability of Rural Services, published by the Scottish Executive in October 2002. Point location data for services was obtained from various public and commercial sources. Where postcode of the service was available, this was georeferenced using the National Records of Scotland's 2002 Postcode Index File (PIF) (and earlier years where required). The drive times catchments were calculated based on the service as the starting point and the properties of the local road network. Each of the road classes within the road network is automatically assigned a speed, considered to be the average for that class of road during off-peak conditions. No modelling was undertaken to take account of variations in speed or delay at junctions during rush hour peak periods. However they do take account of the lower average speeds encountered in built up areas. The drive time software utilised for this analysis was MapInfo Drivetime V6 using Streetline Routing Data from MapInfo. The Postcode Index File 2002 was used to calculate the number of households within each of the drive time catchments. For more information, see http://www.scotland.gov.uk/library5/rural/asrs-25.asp