Examination of Witnesses (Questions 11360
- 11379)
11360. LORD JAMES OF BLACKHEATH: Am I
right in thinking the new taxi location is somewhat removed now
from the original taxi position adjacent to the ticket booking
office and that there is no ticket booking office beside the new
taxi location?
11361. MS LIEVEN: That is right, my Lord,
inasmuch as, if we just use this plan, the existing ticket office
is approximately here. The position for the new ticket office
is not finally fixed but it will be somewhere (and Mr Berryman
will tell me if I have got this wrong) in the middle of the station.
So it will be further away from the taxi—
11362. LORD JAMES OF BLACKHEATH: It will
be inconvenient for anybody using a taxi to bring their luggage
in and then have to drag it across to the ticket office and then
back to wherever they need to go.
11363. MS LIEVEN: My Lord, there are
going to be lifts and, I believe, an escalator down from the Red
Star deck into the body of Paddington Station. So although it
will be slightly further than it is at the moment, it is not going
to be a particularly difficult—
11364. LORD JAMES OF BLACKHEATH: I guess
about 150 yards.
11365. MS LIEVEN: I would not have thought,
my Lord—I cannot give you the precise measurement—so
far as that, given that there will be lifts and escalators. It
will not be as close as it is at the moment, but compared to other
central London stations it will not be, in the least bit, a difficult
manoeuvre.
11366. LORD BROOKE OF ALVERTHORPE: The
new ticket hall will be easier for people getting down on to the
Underground, will it not?
11367. MS LIEVEN: It will be slightly
closer, my Lord, yes. There will be swings and roundabouts. A
critical point is one that Mr Zamit has touched on, which is because
Crossrail is a fast, through route that goes all the way to the
City, if you are coming from Heathrow, say, and you want to go
to the City, or indeed to the West End, at the moment there is
quite a strong incentive to get off the Heathrow Express and get
into a taxi—it is a manoeuvre you see hundreds of people
doing every day—but because of Crossrail the quicker thing
to do, rather than battling with central London traffic, will
just be to stay on Crossrail and go straight through to the City.
So it is by no means the case that Crossrail will increase the
number of people needing a taxi; in fact, there is quite strong
evidence that it is likely to decrease taxi use. Although, of
course, as Mr Zamit says, nobody knows what is going to happen
in ten years' time, and there may be other factors that come into
play.
11368. Mr Zamit, I think I will leave it there
and I will ask Mr Berryman to deal with other—
(Mr Zamit) Just on that last point, I
think there is an incentive for people to stay on Crossrail, but
all the people who live south of Hyde Park (maybe not Mayfair
but to the south) may still decide that Paddington is a better
venue to go to and a more convenient venue. I am not sure they
are going to want to get out at Tottenham Court Road or Bond Street
and try looking for a taxi to take them to wherever they are going.
So I think Paddington will still be a popular destination for
taxis. Whatever the investment is and whatever the improvements
are, we are not going to stop now the numerous taxis that come
to Paddington (I do not know how familiar you are with the area)
and drop the passenger without heavy luggage (just light luggage
or no luggage) off in Spring Street and they walk over to Paddington
Station, or they drop them off in Eastbourne Terrace, so that
a lot of them do not use even what is there. Those people will
say "Drop me off in Spring Street" because it will be
cheaper as well, so it is nearer to the station. So we are still
going to have that age-old problem of people coming by taxi to
the station but who will not actually use the facilities provided.
I am nervous of the future, as I have said, for chauffeur cars
and "meeters and greeters". At the moment, you go down
the little steps on Eastbourne Terrace. If there are lifts as
well it is going to be better but it is not as good as getting
off at a lower-level crossing.
11369. LORD YOUNG OF NORWOOD GREEN: It
is difficult to predict and I understand the point you make, Mr
Zamit, but on the face of it, regardless of those other habits—Spring
Street (and you cannot rule those out)—this looks a better
system than what currently exists, apart from the fact that you
have, as Lord James said, to negotiate a bit further and go in
a lift. In terms of getting the taxis in and out again, this,
to me, looks more efficient than currently. I have used Paddington
a lot.
(Mr Zamit) We welcome this and the best news we have had
in all these proceedings is that the Red Star deck, the new provision,
is going to be a permanent situation for the taxis and not a temporary
position. We have wanted this for too many years than I can remember,
and we do welcome it, but it still does throw up these other problems
that we want to be involved in. We just think they should be looking
to improve the capacity of the taxi ranking stands and looking
at ways to get rid of problems that we know exist already.
11370. LORD YOUNG OF NORWOOD GREEN: I
wanted to comment, my Lord Chairman, on a more general point,
on this question of consultation. Here we have a group of residents
who want to participate in a constructive manner. As I listened
to Mr Zamit describe one of those liaison panel meetings I had
a great deal of sympathy with him. I am not sure who is chairing
these meetings but it needs to be done very effectively; you have
a long agenda and the danger is you will miss them. Obviously,
there is a limit to how much involvement, but given that here
is an organisation that is offering constructive comments, my
question to Ms Lieven is: how can we get round this problem? Is
there the ability for PRACT to submit written submissions, etc,
or whatever? What do you suggest?
11371. MS LIEVEN: My Lord, given that
it is the last week I will swap into evidence-giving mode. I have
a great deal of sympathy as well, and anybody who has been involved
in local organisations, particularly around major infrastructure
projects, knows that these meetings can go on forever, and they
are very difficult. Some of it is just practical, and we are doing
our best, in terms of giving these meetings the right information
and giving it to them in the right form. There is absolutely no
reason why, if PRACT want to make written comments on something,
that cannot be handled in that way so that it does not have to
involve half-an-hour in a meeting where PRACT put their detailed
points. If they are given information in advance, whether on the
web, or whatever, and they make written comments, then that is
wholly appropriate and, often, a much better use of time.
11372. Insofar as how the meetings themselves
go on, I suspect all Members of the Committee will know that that
depends so much on the chair of the particular meeting, but, also,
the spirit of co-operation within the meeting. That is one of
the difficulties that projects like this have. PRACT are, clearly,
an expert body doing their absolute best in a very constructive
spirit. That may not necessarily be true for every group we work
with up and down the route. On the other hand, we cannot have
one set of rules for one group and one set of rules for another
group, because that would immediately lead us into enormous trouble.
To some degree the Committee has to rely on the good faith of
the Promoters, which, in my submission, has been clearly borne
out, for example, by what Mr Zamit has said, but also our expertise.
We have a large community liaison group within Crossrail, a number
of whom gained experience on the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, which
was generally a very successful project in terms of community
liaison, and we have tried to take the best practice from that
and bring it forward to this project.
11373. LORD YOUNG OF NORWOOD GREEN: There
is a last point I want to make on it. I cannot see the words in
front of me now, but the phrase you used in relation to the liaison
panel was "at an appropriate stage in the design ... "
The point I am trying to address, which I think is the point Mr
Zamit was making, is that at a point where they could possibly
influence options or say to you: "Have you considered this
possible solution to it?" (it is that phrase you used—"appropriate"),
are they involved at a point where they could influence your decisions?
11374. MS LIEVEN: They certainly are
at the moment, my Lord, yes, undoubtedly. There is a difficulty
in some areas, which is that if you put ideas forward then you
can set a lot of hares running and you can make discussion with
the local community very difficult. One can quite see with PRACT
that is not a problem but, as I said a moment ago, you have to
use the same rules for everybody or we get into terrible trouble.
Certainly in terms of the information that we refer to in this
undertaking, in terms of information sharing, we would hope to
put out information in a form and at a stage where people could
comment on it in a meaningful way.
11375. Certainly on the above-ground works that
are covered by Schedule 7, that is covered within the Schedule
7 process. I am going to call Mr Berryman in a moment, who I think
will indicate that so far as the below-ground works are concerned,
then that is often more a question for engineers and for consultation
with London Underground and there may be less information given
at an earlier stage. One, the parameters are just that much more
fixed—we have to build in accordance with London Underground
standards, and obviously that is highly influenced by safety—but,
also, there is no amenity issues about the visual impact of those
kind of works, so there may be slightly different issues there.
Examined by THE
COMMITTEE
11376. LORD BROOKE OF ALVERTHORPE: I
would like to ask Mr Zamit if he has any experience of coming
in and giving guidance at the design stage? Could he be a little
more precise at which point he or his organisation were coming
in to make its input?
(Mr Zamit)
My experience for many years for SEBRA is on the planning side,
where we get applicants putting in applications who do not talk
to us, and often they do not even read the Council's policies.
If we talk to them in the early stages, when they have developed
some idea of what they want to build, it can be of great benefit
to them and us and the City Council, so they do not go in with
stupid things and they do not realise this or they do not realise
that. Our experience with TfL on bus routes is that they just
go in and put bus routes in and, more important, bus stops. We
had a bus route put in Queensway, Route 70, years ago with about
six bus stops and there was very little consultation and they
decided to put the bus stops up and every single bus stop they
put in had to be moved, because we knew who lived above it or
the consequences of sheltering in a block of flats next door.
At the end of the day they said, "We wished we'd talked to
you before because we'd put them in a better location, not just
for you but a better location for us as well—a more sensible
location". We find it is better to talk earlier on. I agree
you cannot talk at the very early stages. In this particular instance,
I would feel that earlier consultation is better. If you do not
consult with people who address it sensibly—and we will
certainly do our best to do it by letter—you can often send
out a consultation document which in itself is flawed and people
are complaining about what you are proposing, whereas if you had
got some of the basic issues sorted out you could have had a much
more meaningful consultation on a better document. Lots of people
say, "We haven't got the time to talk to you", and I
say, "If you make the time it'll be quicker and a much better
result for everybody". I think we have got the experience
to bring to the table. Certainly John Walton, our Secretary, has
got enormous experience on this and other issues. Our experience
of the meetings—they are very well chaired at the moment
but there is too much to go through in one meeting. I think there
has been a suggestion that has to be put to the next meeting that
there should be, one, more frequent meetings, but maybe split
into groups. We have got to look at the whole of this matter at
this consultation. I do think we can work with Crossrail and the
relevant people and bring a lot to the table. Let us face it,
we live in the area and we know people's walking habits. People
do not do enough site visits and they go at the wrong time of
day. They go and look at Queensway at ten o'clock in the morning
when it is as dead as a doornail. They should go there on a Sunday
night and see what Queensway is like. We can bring that input
of the way people walk to a station, the way they leave a station,
how their friends pick them up and how they get dropped off. It
is just good, useful, commonsense information that we have. It
is not unfair to them; they just do not know because they do not
live there. People who use the station may be able to comment
on it. I think we have just got a lot to bring to the table.
11377. LORD BROOKE OF ALVERTHORPE: What
did you think of Ms Lieven's suggestion as a way forward?
(Mr Zamit)
I think if we could be brought in—and I am sure these days
with the master of emails we can have a good input and we can
do a lot of talking to our people—I certainly think we welcome
that offer to consult us. We are not asking for long, long meetings
and for the other side to do long, long minutes. We just want
to have an input. We care about the area we live in—we are
passionate about where it is—and we want a good railway
station for London, England and for the area.
11378. CHAIRMAN: Mr Zamit, are there
members of the group who are particularly interested in certain
aspects of this? We have dealt a great deal with the taxis. One
of the ways of avoiding having immensely long meetings is if you
have somebody who is charged with a particular issue, and who
is trusted by all of the colleagues and can actually take that
forward and be the main protagonist?
(Mr Zamit)
Yes, we have several representatives of over a thousand people.
We do an extensive report on what we are doing and most of the
subjects we have talked about today are all covered in our newsletter,
and we have an input from them. We are not asking for meetings
with lots of our members going to the meetings. We are prepared
to organise our members and our concerns and channel it through
John Walton on behalf of those four groups. We are not asking
Crossrail to get into a dialogue with our members; it is only
the associations, and only that through one main group, PRACT.
We just want the information sent to one point. We will do all
the distribution. We have AGMs, we have other meetings, and we
can get feedback from people with disabilities and other people
who use the station. We just want one point of contact as far
as Crossrail is concerned. From our members' point of view it
is with PRACT. The general public can still go to these exhibitions.
11379. Do I understand then that you will be
aiming to have more specialist people dealing with the Promoters
and Westminster City Council on certain aspects who, as it were,
take the lead?
(Mr Zamit) I think we have got members
on our committees where they will feed in through John Walton—we
have got people in the Marylebone Society, myself and others—but
we will not be splitting into individual people; it will all be
through one main heading through the Secretary of PRACT. We will
not allocate different people because we think that will make
it more complicated for Crossrail to deal with.
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