The Palmhouse - Transport Planning consultant ignores circa 500 daily Ubers
I have been going through the various documents for the Palmhouse (the new Pergola on the Roof). One of these documents is a Transport Statement conducted by transport planning consultant Robert West. On page 32, table 6.3 shows the baseline estimates for mode of travel of guests of the Palmhouse. In this table the consultant proposes that 2% to 5% of guests are expected to arrive by taxi. I believe anyone with any common sense will immediately recognize that these numbers are vastly understating the actual use of Uber and the impact it will have on Putney High Street and the surrounding streets. To test this, I called the consultant Robert West and asked about the anomaly in its data. The company confirmed that the input data for its “TRICS outputs” that developed the 2-5% taxi usage range is from data samples that are predominantly from before the period in which Uber gained ground in London. Therefore, the table effectively excludes Uber usage in its assertion that only a minimal share of the guests will arrive by taxi. We can thus only conclude that the conclusions are deceptive and should be treated as void. On page 6 of the Design & Access Statement for The Palmhouse, the applicants show the target demographic. It shows that the venue predominantly attracts 25 to 34 years olds. In 2017, Uber revealed it had 3.5 million users in London, accounting for circa 40% of the population. We can assume that the vast majority of 25 to 34 years old are users of Uber. Whilst there are to my knowledge no reliable statistics on the prevalence of Uber usage among this age group, I have conducted a simple experiment by asking friends of a similar age what the probability was that they would travel by Uber to a venue like The Palmhouse situated within a suburb of London. The responses indicated a 60% chance of taking Uber. At 3,000-4,000 guests per week (as per the application) and assuming every other Uber is shared with another person (i.e. 1.5 passengers per Uber), that implies 2,800 Ubers dropping off and picking up people at The Palmhouse per week, or circa 500 per day. In other words, even ignoring the suppliers to the venue, The Palmhouse will resort in significant more congestion in Putney. This has been completely overlooked/ignored in the application.
Sjoerd de Koning ● 2848d9 Comments