London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (Amendment) Bill

Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2011 Grand Committee

[Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville]

My Lords, this is the first time that I have spoken on this Bill. I did not speak on Second Reading and I have not spoken so far this afternoon. Through carelessness, I was out of the Room when the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, was moving this amendment. I do not know how much he has said about the views in the Newspaper Society on these matters. I know that he was consulted and so I imagine that he has and I shall read them thereafter.

I have a couple of questions to ask my noble friend the Minister arising out of the exchanges that have just occurred. I totally understand that these traffic forecasts are extremely difficult to make, and that has been illustrated in the speeches that have already been made. My question relates to how far there is detailed traffic planning in the context of each individual venue in London where aspects of the Olympics are taking place. My noble friend Lady Heyhoe Flint referred to Lord’s; we of course know about Greenwich, and my noble friend Lord Crickhowell was telling me at lunch about some pretty disagreeable experiences that they are having already in the vicinity of Wimbledon. Are the forecasts that we are talking about all related to east London, or are they in fact in separate places as well? In saying that, I have temporarily forgotten the second thing that I was going to ask, so I may intervene on my noble friend the Minister or indeed on the noble Lord, Lord Coe, while they respond to the debate.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, I appreciate that behind this amendment is a concern about minimising the impact of the Olympic route network—the ORN—on people living and working in the areas concerned. I am pleased to be able to assure noble Lords that that is one of our key objectives in implementing the ORN for the 2012 Games and that extensive local consultation and communication are already under way and will continue through to the Games. I am most grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, for her very helpful clarifications on a range of points that were raised by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, in his opening remarks.

The provision of an ORN to facilitate transport of the athletes, officials, accredited media and marketing partners who together form the Games family is part of the host city contract with the International Olympic Committee. The ORN is a tried and tested concept used at previous Games to ensure that all those working at the Games get to where they need to be safely and on time every time, while keeping London moving. In response to the question from my noble friend Lord Brooke, that of course includes all the different venues in and around London.

The vast majority of the ORN roads will be open to all road users. The Games family will be transported as efficiently as possible with most, including marketing partners, travelling by bus or coach; at peak times, on some sections of the ORN, the traffic flow will include a Games family vehicle passing every four seconds.

In response to my noble friend Lady Doocey, where feasible the Games family will be encouraged to use public transport, and Transport for London is working with the London Organising Committee on the supply of Oyster cards for them. Of course, we take into account the problem she highlighted of the stress that there will be on normal travellers on London transport. That will need to be monitored very carefully to make sure that they are not severely disadvantaged by this.

The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, mentioned river services. There will be enhanced river services on the Thames. These may be an attractive option for spectators travelling to the Greenwich venues, but they are unlikely to attract many Games family members due to their relatively low speed and frequency. They do, however, mean that all options for delivering effective Games-time transport are being utilised. The river, of course, provides a particularly appealing way of travelling through London.

The roads forming the ORN have already been designated, and the impact assessments for the designation orders made it clear that there are two stages to implementation of the ORN, the first being the designation and the second being the development of the detailed designs for measures on the roads, which includes the formal consultation on traffic regulation orders required for the measures. I stress that there have been consultations at every stage of this development.

The sorts of considerations listed in the amendment are most appropriate for this second stage. Transport for London is working closely with the boroughs in London, and the ODA and local authorities outside are working through the consultations, which are well under way. There is a wide-ranging programme of information and advice to business about the potential impact of the Games, including the ORN, on the transport system. That started last November, enabling businesses to plan ahead and minimise the impact on their operations. Information and publicity campaigns to the general public about Games transport and the ORN will begin next year.

The consultation process on the ORN measures is enabling Transport for London and the Olympic Delivery Authority to take account of responses from those living on and around the ORN, and those who may be affected by it in the development of the detailed plans. In particular, the ORN traffic regulation orders are going through the standard statutory procedures which include informal and then formal consultation. Detailed plans are being adjusted, where possible, in the light of the comments and representations received, further to reduce the impacts. As an example, as a result of intensive work with the boroughs and other key stakeholders prior to the launch of public consultation, Transport for London has reduced the number of planned pedestrian crossing closures on the ORN from 115 to 48, and received very few requests in the subsequent engagement process for crossings to be reopened. I also assure noble Lords that all the traffic measures are subject to road safety audits.

The ORN will be implemented with the minimum impact on London. Noble Lords asked about the timescale; it is expected to be brought into operation just a couple of days before the Olympic Games and discontinued swiftly when it is no longer needed. The ORN will operate only when and where it needs to as determined by the training and competition schedule. When a competition venue runs for only a few days, the ORN will need to operate only during these periods. The same strategy will be employed for the smaller scale Paralympic route network during the Paralympic Games.

Temporary Games lanes for use by Games family vehicles will be used on the busiest sections of the ORN only at certain times. Where lanes are required, these will tend to be those closest to the middle of the road, helping to minimise disruption to buses, cyclists and taxis. Lanes will not take up the whole road width in any direction. The noble Baroness, Lady Billingham, was very concerned that the wrong people might be seen to be using the lanes. In the case of the sponsors, of course, they are entitled in certain circumstances to use of the Games lanes, because they have contributed very greatly to ensuring that funding is in place for the success of the Games. As a sideline, in that I often have to speak about tourism in this House, if they are staying at the Dorchester and spending money at our hotels it will be an extremely welcome boost to the London tourist industry. So all is not lost if some people who come to the Games are living at central London locations and taking advantage of the facilities available in central London hotels.

At Second Reading and again this evening, noble Lords raised the potential impact of the ORN on taxis. I assure noble Lords that taxis will, like any other vehicle, be able to use the vast majority of the ORN, but they will not be able to use the Games lanes when they are in operation. During their operating hours, Games lanes will be well used by Games family traffic, and if taxis were added to this mix it would be impossible to guarantee journey times for the Games family. But the vast majority of the lanes, as the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, made clear, will be fully usable by taxis.

In line with the overarching aim of seeking to minimise, as much as possible, any adverse impact at Games time, I assure the Committee that we are working closely with the industry on the detailed plans for individual sections of the ORN to plan pick-up and drop-off points and to mitigate, where practicable, the impact of other planned access and turn restrictions. Transport for London is currently reviewing all such suspended turns on the network and examining the impact on traffic flows and journey times before making recommendations for each turn. Transport for London has already agreed to lift a number of such restrictions for taxis and will continue to meet regularly, every month, with representatives of the taxi trade in the run-up to the Games, because we recognise the very important part that taxis will play when we have so many visitors here in London. More widely, information packs are being put together for all taxi and private hire drivers, which will cover the ORN, venues and other details about the Games, ensuring that drivers can operate effectively and make the most of the opportunities that the Games offer.

In response to the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, I can confirm that LOCOG is undertaking detailed planning of the transport arrangements at each venue, which I think I referred to earlier. I think that I have also covered the point on the pedestrian closures, to which the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, referred, and the planned road closures and other traffic measures. The process is expected to be completed by spring next year, when the details should be very readily and widely available.

There were questions on the increase of transport, and my noble friend Lady Doocey mentioned the concern about the numbers that have been mentioned. Under normal conditions, there are 23.8 million trips per day in London, on the figures that I have here, and up to 3 million additional trips in London on the busiest day of the Games, with more than 600,000 people travelling to the Olympic Games on the busiest day. So we will need to reduce non-Olympic demand by approximately 30 per cent to ensure that London can keep moving, although there will need to be large reductions at specific stations and on specific lines, and that scale of reduction has been achieved at previous Games.

One other aspect of that, which was raised just recently, is the anticipation that the standard tourist traffic is likely to reduce during Games time. Concern has been expressed by people in the hospitality sector that, although the traffic coming to the Games will increase, they will lose on the other side people who come for normal tourist activities at that time of year. So there may be some balancing out of the numbers in the city, but we all recognise what an incredibly busy city London is and that there will undoubtedly be pressures on all the methods of transport during the time of the Games.

I hope that I have been able to assure noble Lords that their very reasonable concerns and the issues that have been raised in the course of this debate are under active consideration and the plans of the ORN’s operation are being developed and communicated. Once again, the need for clear communication has been raised by a number of noble Lords. On that basis, I hope that the noble Lord will feel free to withdraw the amendment.

[Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville]

My Lords, I did not interrupt my noble friend the Minister during her speech because I did not want to break her continuity. I have now remembered the question that I wanted to ask; it enables me also to express pleasure in the presence of the noble Lord, Lord Coe, that the name Mandeville was selected as one of the celebrities associated with the Games. On the strength of Mandeville having been included, I paid my first pilgrimage to Much Wenlock earlier this year in order to learn about the Olympian Games in the 19th century.

I have a question for the Minister, who I do not think made any reference to this issue in her response and, therefore, it is possible that it was not a question that the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, asked. The Newspaper Society, in addition to all the other what I would call games-related issues, is concerned about what will happen to newspaper deliveries in terms of haulage transport during the Games. The question about which there was concern is, if there are going to be last-minute road closures, it is vital that postcode data relating to road closures are communicated on a website as soon as they are known. It is really a case of whether they will all be done on the same website, which would make matters much simpler from the point of view of anyone relying on that data.