Transport needs study

Addressing the area served by

Farningham Road Railway Station

A review of public transport usage and need in the villages of Horton Kirby, South Darenth, Sutton at Hone and Hawley.

April 23^rd 2004

1.0 Foreword

This study has been carried out in the four villages most obviously affected by the proposed changes in service from Farningham Road. It was commission following a number of responses from the SRA who were unable or unwilling to provide any data to support the proposed changes. It was concluded that empirical data that either supports or conflicts with the proposals is required before any argument can be made in favour or against.

2.0 Executive Summary

The villages of Sutton at Hone, South Darenth and Horton Kirby have approximately 3100 households of which 2400 are with 20 minutes walk of Farningham Road station.

A key contribution to the diverse social demographic and relatively stable community in the parishes is good access to employment of all types. The cornerstone of this access is the Railway station.

Approximately 330 people use peak time services from Farningham Road. This means more than one in ten household’s has a regular peak time commuter of which 90% walk to and from the station. Nearly 80% of adults use the station for either work or as occasional leisure travellers with London Victoria only 40 minutes away up the line and the Medway towns 20 minutes down the line.

Access to school and college is important to parents and the schools of choice are in the contra-peak direction. Similarly, 70% of teenage children in surveyed homes use the trains for access to leisure.

The headline figures tell a compelling story for rail use and with improved bus services the area could be viewed, as a model of how public and private transport can be best used to minimise congestion and contribute to the social and economic health of a community.

The proposals to reduce the Victoria service to a single train in the morning peak from the current seven will mean that approximately 275 people will get on at Farningham Road or drive to another station to use a different route. Multiply this by the number of other affected stations and your either have a dangerously overloaded train or thousands new car journeys each day, many of them along single-track roads.

The proposal to completely remove the contra-peak service will mean that the train will not be an option for school children. This will mean that the freedom to choose a school for parents will be limited to those with the time and resources to drive their children there. It will also have an impact on those workers who travel to the Medway towns by train and shift workers who will not have a service to bring them home from London in the mornings.

3.0 Introduction

Recent changes in the funding of rural bus services exposed a requirement to study the transport needs of these village communities. At approximately the same time the SRA proposals for an Integrated Kent Franchise became visible and the two issues were combined to ask the community “what do you need from a public transport service”. This document will address only those issues that apply directly to rail travel but a comprehensive document that addresses both rail and bus travel can be made available on request.

Questionnaires have been taken house to house in order to establish who uses public transport and what they use it for. The findings have been tabulated to provide an empirical basis for statements of current and on going needs.

4.0 Overview

Farningham Road station sits on the boarder between the parish of Sutton at Hone in Dartford Borough and the parish of Horton Kirby and South Darenth in Sevenoaks District. Within the two parishes there are approximately 3100 households of which 2400 or so are within reasonable walking distance of Farningham Road.

South Darenth and Sutton at Hone merge at their boarder in the general area of the station and anyone not familiar with the area would find it difficult to say where one ends and the other begins.

The parishes are made up of mixed housing stock with a high proportion dating from before world war two. More recent development has generally been limited to infill sites as all of the villages sit within the green belt.

This has made the area popular and affordable for people from across the socio-economic spectrum. The range of house type and size available and the price point they occupy has resulted in good representation of all A-E demographic groups. A key component of this economic diversity has been good access to employment and this has contributed to a stable community with several generations of some families living within parish boundaries.

5.0 Employment

The traditional mixture of agricultural, industrial and commuting employment of the Darent Valley has changed considerably in the last twenty years. The biggest local employer, Horton Kirby paper mill ran down operations to a close in 2002 and farming continues to employ less and less people. The local travel to work area takes people to Dartford, Sevenoaks, Gravesend and the Medway towns, typically by car.

Most of the balance travel into Central London by train from Farningham Road.

Clearly a sustainable local economy requires good access to employment and with the railway in place as a viable conduit, replacing the mill as a local employer had been seen as a priority to balance local work patterns and reduce car travel.

6.0 Education

The schools in the parish take children up to year 6. Secondary education requires the use of the school bus or a train depending on which school is attended. The village’s fall within the catchment area of a school, which by virtue of its distance away provides a bus. Parents exercising choice will typically send their children on the train to get them to schools of which the more popular ones are towards the Medway towns.

Access to higher education, particularly agricultural college is via the trains and a change up the line at Swanley.

7.0 Road travel

With the exception of the A225 the roads in and around the villages are at best narrow and many are single track with passing points. Once on the A225 going south the A20 is quickly reached, however, going north congestion on the southern edge of Dartford tails back virtually to Hawley for most of the day.

Travelling northeast through the single-track lanes in the direction of the new terminal at Ebbsfleet will require crossing the busy B260 Green Street Green Road. Once across and into single track Shelbank Lane the junction at Bean will need to be negotiated. Both of these junctions are existing scenes of congestion as is the longer route via the M25/A2 and Bluewater slip road.

The mix of house type, many dating from before the second war means that parking is limited in all of the villages and is particularly acute on the A225 Main Road, Sutton at Hone where heavy goods vehicles are driven at uncompromising speed along a standard width road with parked car either side.

8.0 The study

Volunteer workers conducted the study door-to-door. Residents were asked a series of questions as to their current use and need for public transport. These reviewed the travel to station habits, time, destination and frequency of use plus type of ticket, method and place of purchase. The questions did not specifically address the onward journey from London termini however the majority of peak time travellers from Farningham Road report that they work in the Victoria, West End and City areas.

9.0 Study results

This release of the study has used the data from the first 1000 individuals to respond and is presented to coincide with the deadline for comment to the SRA IKF consultation period. It is intended as a placeholder with the SRA who we trust will accept a later release that will include all responses received and consequently may have some adjustments to the values given below.

More than 10% of all homes in the surveyed villages have a peak time commuter.

In approximately 80% of households questioned at least one person makes use of the train service from Farningham Road for work, leisure or education.

90% of Farningham Road users walk to and from the station.

Only 46% are drivers with access to a car at the time they need to travel.

The most popular adult destination for peak time travel is London Victoria.

The most popular adult destination for off peak travel is Bromley South.

70% of children in households questioned make use of the station for access to leisure.

Most travel to school is in the contra-peak direction.

48% of child travel is off peak.

The most popular station for children is London Victoria followed by Bromley South.

15% of tickets of all types from Farningham Road are purchased elsewhere.

13% of season tickets from Farningham Road are purchased elsewhere.

25% of annual season tickets from Farningham Road are purchased elsewhere.

10.0 Conclusions

With one in ten households including a peak time traveller it is reasonable to conclude that 10% of the local economy depends, at least in part, on access to employment via Farningham Road. If the station is down graded as proposed this may have an impact on the economic health of the area with residents diverting resources to travel to an alternative station or changing employment to a lower paid position within driving distance of home.

With 90% of users currently walking to the station a major road traffic problem will be presented if a significant number choose to drive to another station. Not only will the already congested roads and key junctions mentioned in 7.0 above take a further pounding but also two new parking problems will be created.

Rail heading at any of the addressable stations such as Swanley, Dartford or Ebbsfleet will not only exacerbate existing traffic difficulties in the approach to each of these, it will compound already intolerable parking situations. Even the case for Ebbsfleet with its proposed 9000 parking spaces is less than certain give the number of affected stations and the volume of new houses proposed in the gateway corridor. It will also add considerable cost and time to the commuter’s journey not to mention all of the green issues that such a change of travel patterns will bring.

It is also worth considering the effect of stress on the traveller with these new patterns. Rather than the relatively low stress walk to the station and a few stops on the tube at the other end our commuter will now drive his second car to the Multi-storey car park at Ebbsfleet. He will join a train to the wrong side of London then take a tube ride back across town to his office, probably enduring a longer door to door journey. With millions of man-days each year already attributed to stress this would appear to be a retrograde step.

The second parking problem will be in the streets of the villages themselves. 54% of travellers currently have no access to a car for commuting. They don’t need one they walk to the station. It is reasonable to conclude that a significant number of these people will buy a second car to run to the station in the morning. These cars are going to be parked in the street in the evenings and at weekends adding to the existing pressure for parking in the villages.

The needs of the child traveller have been very badly overlooked. Most travel to school journeys are made in the contra-peak direction. Under the proposals these services will be lost altogether. This is a major blow to the notion of choice for secondary education. The “local” school provides a bus to collect children from the village, however the schools that many parents elect for their children can only be reached by train or by driving. This proposal will limit choice to families that have the time and resources to drive to their preferred school.

A second group that is disenfranchised by the loss of any contra-peak service is the central London shift worker. While they may finish work at 6am they will have to wait until after 9.30 for a train to bring them home to bed.

In light of the findings of our study it is our view that the proposals within the consultation document will not meet the needs of the travelling public who are resident in the villages currently served by Farningham Road station. They will have a profound impact on the social and economic health of the communities. This will touch every age group and are particularly harsh on the youth of the parishes.

It is difficult to conclude that any consideration to the needs in this community or any other similarly affected community has been included in the development of these plans and we urge you in the strongest terms to reconsider the proposals with the full engagement of your customers.