Notting Hill Carnival Strategic Review - Intelligent Space

of the Carnival procession would be reversed, moving from east to west (as opposed to west
to east, as had been tested under the Carnival Public Safety Project). Additional changes
included the use of Elkstone Road as a ‘marshalling area’ for the floats and the relocation of
the judging point to the Great Western Road.
2.84 The Carnival Review Group were of the view that if this option were to be considered, the use
of the Harrow Road would also have to be considered in conjunction with a range of other
measures in order for the change to be effective. One such measure - the possible relocation
of large sound systems outside of the route - would encourage a greater spread of Carnival
activities away from the route. In view of the fact that the sound systems appeared to be the
‘main attraction’ at Carnival, the Review Group acknowledged that this would inevitably result
in a larger Carnival area footprint. The Review Group also expressed concern that since the
interim route had not been subjected to the same risk assessment process as those alternative
routes submitted under the Carnival Public Safety Project. As a result of this omission, the
Review Group decided to undertake a second phase of the Safety Project to analyse the
interim route.
Carnival Public Safety Project (Phase II): Carnival 2002
2.85 In 2002, the Carnival attracted approximately 15 per cent more visitors overall than 2001. The
total attendance was 818,200 (360,200 on Sunday and 502,400 on Monday). This increase in
attendance was strongly associated with a rise in popularity of the Sunday, which attracted 34
per cent more visitors in 2002 than in 2001. There was only a 5 per cent increase on the
Monday and this was more than likely to be due to the influence of better weather: Sunday in
2002 was a pleasant sunny day, whereas Sunday in 2001 had wet weather.
Figure (15): Attendance at Carnival 2002 Compared to Carnival 2001
2.86 The geographical pattern of arrivals and departures for visitors was broadly the same in 2001
and 2002 without any significant difference in the overall distribution of pedestrian flows on
each street into Carnival with the majority of visitors entering and exiting the Carnival area
108