Post by nick on Apr 28, 2008 12:03:09 GMT
Hi Guys – congratulations on this excellent forum.
Firstly, and for the avoidance of doubt, I would like to stress that I am most appreciative of the vast majority of the long-needed improvements that have been introduced into the Square, since the change of ownership. I am not therefore, one of those "pre-Westbrook" tenants who automatically assume that any change, which has been introduced without the involvement of an "old Dolphin Square hand" is a change for the worse.
I am however very concerned at the proposals to remove a permanent, visible, human presence from the Car Park and to rely instead, 100%, upon CCTV, remote monitoring from the Security Office and occasional foot patrols. This approach seems to be diametrically opposed to the building management’s repeated assurances that they intend to increase visible security.
I fully recognise that Westbrook need to control costs, if they are to provide the level of services reasonably expected by tenants, however security should surely be the last area for such cost-cutting?
It would make perfect sense to replace the permanent visible human presence in the car park, with automatic access systems, were the automatic access systems capable of preventing pedestrian access to the car park – for instance, modern, purpose built residential and commercial premises’ car parks typically include full floor to ceiling security gates that prevent all unauthorised pedestrian and vehicular access. However, this is not feasible for Dolphin Square’s car park, which is directly accessible by pedestrians via any of the four ramps and four basement corridors (which are themselves easily accessible from the 30+ ground floor entrances).
The basement car park and associated access corridors and House entrances are, as any regular Car Park user knows, routinely utilised by a wide variety of non-resident individuals for everything from skateboarding, to general “exploration”. These activities may be innocent enough, however these same basement spaces also contain a multitude of dark corners and hiding places for those with less innocent intentions, that makes the Car Park a somewhat frightening place, especially after dark, for older tenants and the increasing number of younger female tenants who, by dint of their work hours, have to pass through it late at night.
Although a number of unauthorised visitors are noted on CCTV, many are not and it is routinely left to the Car Park attendants to either deter these unauthorised visitors, by their very presence, or to deal with them accordingly. The Car Park attendants also provide a permanently visible, point of contact and reassuring presence for tenants and are able to discern, from their own personal experience, between authorised and unauthorised pedestrians - something that it is difficult to do via CCTV, given the profusion of un-uniformed building and other staff who regularly access the Car Park.
I was interested to note that I am not being “Paranoid of Pimlico” here: The Home Office produced its own report entitled “Preventing Car Crime in Car Parks” www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/prgpdfs/fcpu34.pdf which concluded as follows:
“Car parks which provide direct and constant supervision by staff of the parking floors suffer little theft from cars. Examples found in this study are the John Lewis car park in Kingston and those car parks in central London which ‘block parked’ cars, for example Selfridges car park and others operated by NCP.
The distinctive feature of these car parks is the presence of staff working directly on the parking floors. There is also much more of a ‘customer service’ quality to the work of car park attendants. Attendants in the John Lewis car park help people who cannot start their cars or who have locked their keys in the car, look out for problems such as dogs or even children left in cars, and so on. In the block parking car parks it was not
uncommon to find attendants washing cars during a lull in business. These tasks add much needed variety to the work of a car park attendant, and staff seemed bright, helpful, and interested in their work. The result of all this is active and constant supervision of parked cars.”
Firstly, and for the avoidance of doubt, I would like to stress that I am most appreciative of the vast majority of the long-needed improvements that have been introduced into the Square, since the change of ownership. I am not therefore, one of those "pre-Westbrook" tenants who automatically assume that any change, which has been introduced without the involvement of an "old Dolphin Square hand" is a change for the worse.
I am however very concerned at the proposals to remove a permanent, visible, human presence from the Car Park and to rely instead, 100%, upon CCTV, remote monitoring from the Security Office and occasional foot patrols. This approach seems to be diametrically opposed to the building management’s repeated assurances that they intend to increase visible security.
I fully recognise that Westbrook need to control costs, if they are to provide the level of services reasonably expected by tenants, however security should surely be the last area for such cost-cutting?
It would make perfect sense to replace the permanent visible human presence in the car park, with automatic access systems, were the automatic access systems capable of preventing pedestrian access to the car park – for instance, modern, purpose built residential and commercial premises’ car parks typically include full floor to ceiling security gates that prevent all unauthorised pedestrian and vehicular access. However, this is not feasible for Dolphin Square’s car park, which is directly accessible by pedestrians via any of the four ramps and four basement corridors (which are themselves easily accessible from the 30+ ground floor entrances).
The basement car park and associated access corridors and House entrances are, as any regular Car Park user knows, routinely utilised by a wide variety of non-resident individuals for everything from skateboarding, to general “exploration”. These activities may be innocent enough, however these same basement spaces also contain a multitude of dark corners and hiding places for those with less innocent intentions, that makes the Car Park a somewhat frightening place, especially after dark, for older tenants and the increasing number of younger female tenants who, by dint of their work hours, have to pass through it late at night.
Although a number of unauthorised visitors are noted on CCTV, many are not and it is routinely left to the Car Park attendants to either deter these unauthorised visitors, by their very presence, or to deal with them accordingly. The Car Park attendants also provide a permanently visible, point of contact and reassuring presence for tenants and are able to discern, from their own personal experience, between authorised and unauthorised pedestrians - something that it is difficult to do via CCTV, given the profusion of un-uniformed building and other staff who regularly access the Car Park.
I was interested to note that I am not being “Paranoid of Pimlico” here: The Home Office produced its own report entitled “Preventing Car Crime in Car Parks” www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/prgpdfs/fcpu34.pdf which concluded as follows:
“Car parks which provide direct and constant supervision by staff of the parking floors suffer little theft from cars. Examples found in this study are the John Lewis car park in Kingston and those car parks in central London which ‘block parked’ cars, for example Selfridges car park and others operated by NCP.
The distinctive feature of these car parks is the presence of staff working directly on the parking floors. There is also much more of a ‘customer service’ quality to the work of car park attendants. Attendants in the John Lewis car park help people who cannot start their cars or who have locked their keys in the car, look out for problems such as dogs or even children left in cars, and so on. In the block parking car parks it was not
uncommon to find attendants washing cars during a lull in business. These tasks add much needed variety to the work of a car park attendant, and staff seemed bright, helpful, and interested in their work. The result of all this is active and constant supervision of parked cars.”
