City Matters 162

CITYMATTERS.LONDON February 14 - March 12 2024 | Page 3
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Mayor of London says TfL fare
freeze will encourage City
workers back to the office
SADIQ Khan has said his decision to freeze
most Tube and bus fares will encourage
more London workers back to the office,
writes Local Democracy Reporter Noah
Vickers.
The mayor announced last week that
pay-as-you-go fares – which account for
around 80 per cent of Tube journeys and
74 per cent of bus journeys – would remain
unchanged until March next year.
Speaking at a London Assembly meeting
on Thursday, Mr Khan said the Covid
pandemic “led to a change in behaviour
of commuters across the globe”, but that
on average, ridership on the Tube is now at
90 per cent of pre-pandemic levels during
the week and on weekends is “sometimes
north of 100 per cent”.
He added: “We think this fare freeze will
encourage even more people back than
would otherwise be the case. It will attract
more people away from hybrid working to
office working.
“But also really importantly, it affects
business rates when it comes to next year,
[and] support London’s hospitality, culture
and retail sectors – which is really important
to our city.”
Mr Khan’s comments came as he faced
questions from assembly members over
the latest draft of his budget for the coming
year – including whether he may soon be
making another surprise announcement
ALMOST £3 million has been earmarked to
tackle a backlog of ‘decorative and building
improvement works’ at the Old Bailey, as part
of wider City of London efforts to address
historic issues across its estate. The condition
of the building was raised during a Court of
Common Council meeting earlier this year,
when Alderman Timothy Hailes described
the stonework as being in an “advanced state
of decay”, writes Local Democracy Reporter
Ben Lynch.
He also noted the ‘not insignificant’ maintenance
backlog for structures across the
City, which includes many of the capital’s
most famous landmarks. This was evidenced
in December last year when a piece of debris
fell from the Old Bailey’s Ceremonial Gates,
with a pedestrian later hospitalised after tripping
over the masonry.
City Surveyors had detailed in a report first
published last year that the cost of required
works to the Corporation’s estate totalled
£130.9m, of which £55.1m consists of the
backlog, and £75.8m for further improvements
planned over the next few years.
During the same Court of Common
Council meeting, on January 11, Deputy
Christopher Michael Hayward, Chair of
the Corporation’s Policy and Resources
on transport.
Liberal Democrat member Caroline
Pidgeon asked about the pot of funding
being used to pay for the fare freeze.
The mayor’s chief of staff, David Bellamy,
told her that the £123 million required to
pay for it had come from a £147 million pot
called the transport innovation fund.
Ms Pidgeon asked the mayor what he
plans to do with the remaining £24 million,
to which he said: “I’ve not decided yet – so
what I’ll be doing over the course of the
next few weeks is setting out where that
money will be spent, if at all.”
She replied: “So we can expect another
announcement of a new initiative over the
coming weeks for £24 million.”
Mr Khan said: “If I decide to do so.”
Conservative member Peter Fortune
asked whether the mayor is considering
the introduction of “Taylor Swift-style
pricing for transport fares”.
The question was a reference to the
dynamic pricing used by Taylor Swift during
her Reputation tour in 2018, though it has
also been used by Bruce Springsteen. A
similar model is used by airlines – with the
idea being that lower fares are available the
earlier they are booked, but increasing as
the date of travel approaches.
With Transport for London (TfL) fares,
dynamic pricing would potentially involve
prices rising and falling in accordance with
Committee, acknowledged the City’s buildings
had been impacted by ‘decades’ of
underinvestment.
On the Old Bailey specifically, he said “it is
an operational asset that has suffered from a
long-term maintenance backlog”.
“The level of funding it has received historically
from cyclical maintenance isn’t in my
view commensurate with a facility of this
size, complexity and intensive use,” he added.
In the report in which the estimated costs
of the works were detailed, officers had
warned: “By not addressing the backlog of
cyclical maintenance works that has accumulated
over several years, the required
Backlog (bow wave) will grow exponentially.
We will shortly reach a point whereby it will
start to affect statutory compliance items and
or cause greater degradation of property.”
In response to a Freedom of Information
(FoI) request submitted by the Local
Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS), the
Corporation has now also revealed further
details of the backlog, and a breakdown of
where funding has been recommended to
be allocated.
The largest item listed is the City of
London Cemetery and Crematorium, to
which £3,613,000 is earmarked. However,
demand on the network.
Mr Khan’s transport deputy, Seb Dance,
said in December that TfL had “been
tasked with looking at various options” for
a more flexible form of pricing, though TfL
commissioner Andy Lord cautioned that
there are “some hard IT challenges” which
would need to be overcome first.
At Thursday’s meeting however, Mr
Bellamy said: “[Fares are] certainly something
we’ve been talking about and looking
at – we are certainly not in a kind of Taylor
Swift-type scenario I think.
“One thing very important to remember
that we consider, is that people need
certainty about what fares they may pay if
they decide to undertake their journey.”
£3m earmarked to clear
Old Bailey maintenance backlog
the building which is proposed to receive the
most money is the £2,920,000 to the Old
Bailey, the majority of which is to be spent
on its North Building (£1m) and South Wing
(£1.03m).
Walbrook Wharf, which is opposite Cannon
Street, meanwhile is noted as requiring
£1,556,500, while Charterhouse Street
Bridge is down for £1,225,000. The Mayor’s
and City of London Court (£872,500) and
London Metropolitan Archive (£765,000) are
also among those recommended to receive
sizable sums.
A City of London Corporation spokesperson
said: “The works referenced, which
are various decorative and building improvement
works, are in addition to general and
routine maintenance, which already takes
place on a regular basis.
“How these works are to be funded is still
to be decided by future committees but we
expect them to be completed within one to
five years.”
The final approval for the investment to
tackle the backlog, which is included as part
of the Corporation’s annual budget-setting
process, will be granted at the Court of
Common Council meeting in March.
Chris Hayward,
City of London Corporation’s
Policy Chairman
WHEN people think of the City of London,
they would be forgiven for picturing modern
skyscrapers alongside historic landmarks
like St Paul’s Cathedral and Tower Bridge,
rather than rolling green meadows and
animals in forests. But you will see the
City of London Corporation’s historic crest
welcoming people to open spaces across
London and its neighbouring counties.
We are the capital’s smallest local
authority area, but we look after its largest
green space, protecting over 11,000 acres
of parks, forests, heaths, gardens, and
historic sites.
These range from the 180 small City
gardens here in the Square Mile, through
iconic London spaces like Hampstead
Heath, to ancient and sprawling woodlands
like Burnham Beeches, and Epping Forest.
They include a wide variety of critically
important wildlife habitats, Sites of
Special Scientific Interest, Special Areas
of Conservation, and National Nature
Reserves, and are protected under
legislation.
Some were given to the care of the City
Corporation after conservation campaigns
in the nineteenth century. We took others
under our wing after the disbanding of the
Greater London Council in the 1980s.
And now a new report has revealed that
these open spaces are worth £282.6 million
each year in benefits to society - and £8.1
billion over 50 years
The report, produced by Natural Capital
Solutions, calculated the value of the benefits
that these open spaces deliver to the
public, including through recreation, health
and wellbeing, air and water quality, and by
removing carbon from the atmosphere.
It found that the overall benefit-to-cost
ratio is 16.4 to 1 – meaning that every £1
spent on maintaining and protecting these
open spaces delivers £16.40 in ‘natural
capital benefits’ for the public.
Our sites enable access to nature in urban
areas, provide space for sports and recreation,
and improve the air that we breathe.
We look after 58,000 ancient trees, and
capture over 16,000 tonnes of carbon
every year - a crucial part of our Climate
Action Strategy, which commits us to
achieving net zero carbon emissions in our
own operations by 2027, and to supporting
the achievement of net zero for the whole
Square Mile by 2040.
In total, these open spaces attract over 47
million visitors annually – over three times
the number who go to Premier League
football matches every season – and host
education courses reaching tens of thousands
of school children every year.
Our spaces won five honours in 2023’s
London in Bloom competition, with a
further 15 taking Green Flag awards, recognising
them as some of the best managed
green spaces in the world.
So, whether you are having a rest in a City
garden, enjoying the views of the Square
Mile from Hampstead Heath, or exploring
Epping Forest, the excellent staff of the City
Corporation - supported by community
volunteers – are working hard to help.
To protect and improve these sites, we
are announcing a new set of environment
strategies to ensure our open spaces are
rich in diversity, conserve nature, create
memories, and enhance the lives of people
who visit them.
These green spaces help make London
the special city which it is, offering quality
of life as well as quantity of business.