LISBON — What does a town have to do to improve its appearance? Town leaders hope a 60-question survey will give them some answers — or at the very least, some suggestions.

Turnout for Wednesday night’s public workshop on Route 196 design standards drew only a few citizens, but members of the Planning Board hope the upcoming survey will generate a lot of interest.

It’s no 30-second survey, town planner Amanda Bunker cautioned.

“To get the kind of information we can rely on, a quick survey wouldn’t do it,” Bunker said. “We expect people to take some time with this. The survey will include a number of photographs to pinpoint what people like and don’t like.”

“People can usually tell you what they don’t like, but it’s not so easy to find out what they do like,” she said. Although hard copies of the survey will be available by Friday at the town office, library and Lisbon Community Federal Credit Union, most responses are expected to come electronically. The survey will also be posted on the town’s website by Friday.

“We’re trying to put the word out,” said Planning Board Chairman Don Fellows, referring to the 250 fliers that were mailed this week to every property owner along the route.

The Route 196 Master Plan, which describes the zoning and future development for three major areas of the town, was approved at Tuesday night’s council meeting.

“This is day one of implementing our officially adopted plan,” Bunker said. “We hope to present the design standards, which are mandatory, and the guidelines, which are voluntary, to the Town Council in January.”

The standards will be put in place through changes in town ordinances. Currently, the town’s definition of building design says architecture should “reflect traditional New England building forms such as pitched roofs, dormers and windows.”

“This isn’t specific enough,” Bunker said, as she showed several properties that meet that definition but ranged from attractive to not so attractive. Even that, she said, is somewhat relative, since beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

“We’re trying to come up with what’s reasonable; we don’t want this to become onerous,” Bunker said. “Yes, we have to raise the bar, but if we raise it too high, we’re shutting people out.”

The standards and guidelines will apply only to nonresidential property on Route 196. The survey is expected to be conducted for about two weeks. The results will be compiled and presented at public hearings before going to the council.