# **1 Introduction**

Access to infrastructure—especially to basic services such as electricity, water, and toilets—is vital to urban well-being (World Bank 1994).<sup>1</sup> Yet, in far too many countries we know very little about the level of access to different services. Data that are reported tend only to measure whether a service is physically available—i.e. the physical presence of a piped water connection, or proximity of households to public transport (Martinez-Santos 2017). In many instances this physical measure of access provides information on potential access but provides little insight on the actual level of usage or functionality of any given service, let alone the quality of service supplied (Shaheed et. al. 2014, Nganyanyuka et. al 2014, UNICEF/WHO 2012). To understand if households are really being served, we need new ways to measure access.

In this paper, we differentiate between three levels of access—nominal, effective, and quality-adjusted access. A household is deemed to have ‘nominal access’ if it has physical access to a service at home, in the yard, or in proximity. A household is deemed to have ‘effective access’ only if two conditions can be satisfied (i) the household has physical access or connection, and (ii) this service works and is relied on by that household. The measure captures a household’s revealed preference – measuring availability as well as ability and willingness of the household to both use and pay for service. It has powerful implications for policy, particularly output-based approaches as it reflects a concern not just for the accessibility of service, but its usefulness and functionality in a way that aligns with global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To take it one step further, we capture the quality and performance of services using a ‘quality-adjusted’ measure of access that accounts not only for functionality but desirable levels of access. For example, in the water sector, effective access measures the number of households with a physical connection that is used as a primary source. In contrast, an appropriate quality-adjusted access indicator might be one that limits this to include only those households with connections that provide continuous 24/7 water supply. This quality-adjusted access measure can be used as a benchmarking tool for achieving not just widespread coverage, but also high-quality service.

Drawing on empirical data from 14,200 households across 15 Kenyan cities, we employ our alternative measures of access to examine how effectively households are being served, how much households are spending and how many are benefiting from high-quality service. We then apply our three measures of access to understand how service varies by settlement type and poverty level in urban Kenya. Using hedonic regression analysis, we explore the perceived value of infrastructure services using data from rental markets. First, we investigate the aggregate impact of infrastructure variables on rent. Then, we examine the relative impact of different infrastructure services on rent and whether higher-quality services translate into higher rents. Finally, we analyze our data to identify factors that systematically impact the likelihood of access for a household to each of the selected infrastructure services.

# **2 Survey Data and Methodology**

To examine questions of access, this study draws on the results of a comprehensive “Kenya State of the Cities” baseline study of over 14,200 urban households in 15 cities, commissioned by the World Bank and the Government of Kenya. The study used face-to-face household interviews to capture key indicators related to the demographic, infrastructure, and economic profile of the following 15 Kenyan

> 1 World Bank. 1994.  World Development Report 1994: Infrastructure for Development.  New York:  Oxford University Press. World Bank.  http://hdl.handle.net/10986/5977.

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