The presentation is now available on the Lewisham Web site


I have posted a short summary and some initial analysis on the Forest Hill Society web site.

Interesting results - which unfortunately doesn't give a clear preference either way!

I think that the online application does skew the results though and would be very wary relying on the online forms as the consensus over those received by phone or post.

To qualify the above, for example, I believe it was advertised on here that every member of the family could fill in the online application, whereas those who sent in the postal jobbie probably wouldn't have bothered to photocopy and complete multiple forms.

I would also hope that the Mayor gives more weight to the opinions and reasons raised rather than just the pure statistical numbers - afterall would those who said they would be 'very unlikely' to use WW (as they favoured DR) really cut of their noses if WW was actually built just up the road?

Interesting - but without knowing the number it's difficult to assess. Not sure if I've read this right, but do we know what percentage of the over all results were from online?

12.5% of the responses were online.

The results need to be split by post code.
This mixed result will then show (imo):

se23 - generally want their pool back (existing site)
se26 - generally want another pool local to them especially if the bridge is under threat.

Given the bias in the survey towards WW, I feel this result in combination with the petition, show that we want our pool back on the existing site as soon as possible.

I am not sure Perryman doing it by postcode is any clearer.

SE23 goes right down to opposite the Savacentre , 3 or 4 mins walk from The Bridhe , whilst SE26 includes Sydenham Hill substancially further from the bridge than Willow Way or Dartmouth Road. Parts of SE26 very close to the old site ( Sydenham School for Ladies for example ) and not sure but think even Holy Trinity School is SE26 , opposite our Library.
SE23 AND SE26 each have parts closer to The Bridge and The Existing Site.
Also historically the pool has always been used by Sydenham people as was their own. I lived in Venner Rd from 49 to 74 and went there many timesd with schools and friends.

Gaz,
I'm not sure how the online responses skew the results. Yes, it is possible for different family members to vote online but it is equally likely for that to happen in favour of either option. What is clear is that those completing online or by post were most interested in swimming (see my reference to slide 10).

Across all groups, people said they would be more likely to visit the pool in Dartmouth Road (see slide 18). This is why national planning guidance recommends building pools in town centres, and we are very lucky to have just such a site which has been in use for the last 125 years.

You could be right, that all those people who said that they would not go swimming in Willow Way would change their minds once the pool is built. But it also at least as likely that, having built a pool in a back street, outside the town centre, on the edge of an industrial park, with even less parking than the Dartmouth Road site, that even less people will choose to swim in Willow Way.

I also think that results could have been significantly different if they had included the other area of Forest Hill in Crofton Park ward, where people were excluded from the survey (other than online). Crofton Park ward includes all the houses on the north side of Standstead Road, whereas every house in Sydenham ward is closer to Willow Way (although I would like to acknowledge that even in Sydenham there is considerable support for the pool to remain in Forest Hill town centre - just probably not a majority).

Where I completely agree with you is that I hope the mayor does not pay too much attention to the statistics, and instead considers what is right for SE23 and the surrounding area; which site can get planning approval for a new pool fastest, which site is best for a pool according to national and regional planning guidance, and according to all the council officers to whom I have spoken, and which pool will be the more inspiring and more visited site.

Brian, you are right.
Those living on the edges of se23 will have different interests:
the perry rise zone will want the bridge to remain and would be best served by there being no new pool. I cant imagine much interest here.

The se26ers on the Dartmouth Rd zone are equally served by both options so I would expect a mixed response here.

So I know it is not perfect, but given each preference was assigned a post code, then as a rough guide, I think it would be very quick and interesting to present the results by postcode.

In fact I'd go as far to say that it is such an obvious breakdown, that it is statistically dishonest not to present the information this way as well.

Gaz - I'm alarmed by your view that online voting forms should be discounted or are unreliable. I voted online - how dare you say that my views should be discounted?

I've talked on the telephone with the Lewisham officer who organised the poll and she is fully confident that all votes are reliable and that stringent checks have been made to ensure this.

Postal voting forms were being distributed like confetti at some of the public meetings I attended just before the consultation. Does this make the postal vote unreliable?

If you have any evidence to support your view, then please come forward with thie evidence.

Otherwise please respect the democratically held views of your community. This isn't Iran.

I'm not saying that anyone's views should be discounted!

I am wary as the online responses are significantly different to the other means of response and if I was the Mayor I would be asking why. I was unaware that postal forms were also being freely distributed as you describe as I only saw the form that was delivered to my home. I would still maintain that trusting just the statistics is undesirable and most value from the consultation would be arrived at by studying the comments given by respondents.

Finally, let me assure you that I just want what is best for Forest Hill and Sydenham; I'm not trying to throw spanners in the works or anything - I just want to be able to swim in FH again!

One bit of analysis I can't find - have I missed it? - is how the total number of votes of active swimmers (those who currently swim elsewhere or at any rate were regular FH pool users - I think we were asked about this?), whether online, by post or by telephone, were split between the options. Might it not be both interesting and relevant to know that?

I hope some public-spirited poster will report here whether anything interesting on the pools issue emerges at the ward meeting tomorrow, for the benefit of those like me who can't make it.

Robin,
There is not yet figures on the split between swimmers and non-swimmers, but we have asked for this split to be included in the final report. However, the consultants did indicate that those who responded by post or online were more likely to be swimmers than those they phoned up at random (which makes sense). That may go part of the way to explaining the differences in views between postal/online and telephone responses.

Those who responded online are more likely to have looked at the plans in detail as these were only available online, not in the survey and certainly not over the phone. For that reason I believe it is fair to assume that the online respondents were best informed of all of the issues and did not just answer the simplistic question 'jam today or no jam tomorrow'.

For me, most significant indicator is the much higher likelihood of use if the pools stay on the present site. More persuasive than the narrow margin that favours willow way.

Also, that the teaching pool is the lowest priority of all the facilities. Seems to me that scrapping the learner pool is the answer to making the existing pools site financially viable.

Is it possible that the number of people who said they were 'unlikely to visit' the WW pools was boosted by tactical voting by those whose main priority is not swimming as such but a desire to ensure that there continues to be a pool on the current site? Even amongst swimmers, I suspect that if the pools were actually built on WW, many would in the event overcome their current distaste for venturing into an 'industrial estate', and put their preference for the bright lights of the 'town centre' on one side.

In reply to Robin Orton: the Council's decision needs to be based on fact and not on a suspicion of the kind you outline. One such fact is the planning policy both of central government and of Lewisham Council. This policy requires that the viability and vitality of town centres be maintained and encouraged by the siting of leisure facilities in those centres. The Willow Way proposal is not commensurate with this highly significant fact. Dartmouth Road is. It is part of Forest Hill, which is listed in the Council's "Unitary Development Plan" as a town centre.

Another fact: Lewisham Council has so far disregarded this policy.

This is all becoming very sad indeed, now even conspiracy theories flourishing behind the curtains of this consultation.

Let s have this new pool built on the WW site along with a few nasty looking blocks right on Dartmouth Road. Your children will swim fairly soon ( maybe ) your grandchildren won t. The old looking Victorian building did disgrace ( as some of you seem to think) Forest Hill for almost a century; If the proposed plans are chosen for the WW site the new pool will look dated and scruffy in 20.

20 years, is what I was supposed to write.

I certainly wasn't suggesting a conspiracy, Millesens. All I was wondering was whether some individual respondents, quite unprompted, might not have been a bit disingenuous in saying, in effect, that they would be significantly less likely to use a new pool in WW than one on the old site.

There were 800 people who said that they would swim in Dartmouth Road but not Willow Way. A few people may have been 'disingenuous' but not 800 people (out of 3,500).

I think those who favour Willow Way should accept that it will have less visitors than the existing site, and whilst that may suit some people in the short term as they will have an empty pool, in the longer term it is not sustainable.

Steve B
When the summary consultation results were presented it was made clear that because a teaching pool was in the lowest band it did not mean that it was least wanted.

They attribute this to the fact that as it is used mostly only by parents of young children and these are a small proportion of the population. Also some people may have thought asking for a swimming pool included a desire for learner pool facilities.

In fact they said the fact it came up as being a facility people wanted was important.

I can see that this would help with the budget but it would certainly mean I (and many others) would be less likely to use it, wherever it was, as the only chance I get to go swimming is with small children in a learner pool!