New York, NY – Who says you can’t fight City Hall? Win or lose, New Yorkers never stop trying. The city ranked second, behind San Francisco, in the number of calls per capita to 311 complaint centers, according to a recent survey.

New York ranked first in the total number of calls (18.7 million), first in the largest increase in calls (16.2 percent) between 2008 and 2009, third in waiting time for a 311 operator to answer (18 seconds), third in the average number of seconds (228) it took for the operator to handle a call, 10th in cost per call and among the lowest in callers who gave up holding (3.6 percent).

In 2009, according to the survey (pdf) by the Pew Philadelphia Research Initiative, the 311 center in New York received 224 calls for each 100 residents, compared with 446 in San Francisco, 185 in Charlotte, N.C., 152 in Baltimore, 151 in Chicago, 110 in Miami and 101 in Houston.

New Yorkers complain or call about noise more than anything else, followed by maintenance by landlords, alternate-side-of-the-street parking regulations, lack of heat or hot water, bus or subway service, lost property in taxis, blocked driveways, disposal of bulky items and parking ticket updates.

In San Francisco, the top categories are street cleaning, graffiti removal, public housing services, requests for other city services, abandoned vehicles and flooded sewers.

The Pew survey looked at 311 systems in 15 large cities, including New York, where the 311 call center began operating in 2003.

(Source:  http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/)