Describing visual data

The table compares the main travel modes reported by two separate samples of college respondents in 2019 and 2024. Bus travel remained the most common option, although its share declined. Cycling recorded the largest increase, while travelling by car became less common. In 2019, forty per cent of respondents selected the bus, compared with thirty-five per cent in 2024. Car use fell more sharply, from thirty to twenty per cent, a decrease of ten percentage points. Together, these two modes accounted for seventy per cent of responses in the earlier survey and fifty-five per cent in the later one. By contrast, cycling increased from ten to twenty per cent. Its share therefore doubled, although it remained below bus travel and walking in 2024. Walking rose more modestly, from twenty to twenty-five per cent. Taken together, walking and cycling represented forty-five per cent of the later sample, compared with thirty per cent previously. The figures suggest a different distribution of reported travel modes across the two surveys, but they do not explain the change. Each sample contains one hundred respondents, and the surveys did not track the same individuals. Consequently, the table cannot establish that particular car users switched to bicycles, or that a specific policy caused the differences. Further information about the samples, journey distances and transport provision would be needed before drawing conclusions for college planning.

This example illustrates structure and tone and may be shorter than the suggested range. Develop your own response.