In the West End of London, Westminster City Council has announced its latest spend on public realm CCTV cameras: in Leicester Square, Chinatown, and Soho; as agreed at a meeting of the Council’s cabinet.
Soho will get 18 cameras as part of a plan supported by the membership group Soho Business Alliance as part of a funding package totalling £309,403. Leicester Square and Chinatown meanwhile will receive 14 cameras in a £213,579 spend, supported by the Heart of London Business Alliance (HOLBA); which covers Piccadilly and St James’s, Leicester Square & Piccadilly Circus and St Martin’s. These cameras – due to come into commission in the summer – will form part of an network of 200 cameras coming in borough-wide. Westminster City Council has arranged for the monitoring to be 24/7 from Hammersmith and Fulham’s control room in west London.
Westminster describes all this as part of the Westminster After Dark strategy, launched earlier this year, a document seeking to balance the commerce and noise-nuisance of the night attractions of the City with community safety.
Aicha Less, deputy leader and Cabinet Member for Communities and Public Protection, said: “Soho, Chinatown and the West End see some of the busiest footfall in the world during peak season. We want people to enjoy our fabulous West End but without the misery of mobile phone theft, pick pocketing, watches being stolen or running into aggressive behaviour.
“Our new cameras will be there alongside mobile council cameras already in use to ensure people can enjoy the West End in safety and opportunist criminals find it a harder place to operate. With these cameras going up over the summer, we are delivering against the commitments of Westminster after Dark.”
HOLBA background
Recent talks by HOLBA raised high operating costs, prohibitive rents and business rates and restrictive planning and licensing policies faced by West End businesses; operational concerns around waste management and public cleanliness; and potential differences between visitor perception of and actual safety. In a report last year, HOLBA raised ‘rising costs, regulatory constraints, crime, and transport challenges’, while welcoming the Mayor of London’s Nightlife Taskforce and Westminster’s After Dark Strategy covering between 6pm and 6am, ‘which closely align with HOLBA’s 2023 Evening and Night-Time Economy Strategy – promoting safety, economic opportunity, and an enriched visitor experience’.
Photo by Mark Rowe: Leicester Square from the south, anti-ram bollards.
