Post Office Closures

A reader called Dan has done some excellent research into the likely impact of planned post office closures in the area. He's dug into the London area branch access report (pdf) (which is on the Post Office's public consultation site), done some maths and submitted the results to the consultation team. You might want to offer to your opinion too, because Dan's research shows that the PO's plans do not look good for Claptonians.

One of the post offices marked for closure is Dan's local (and mine) at 235 Clapton Road. The PO anticipates that the 1,500 customers a week it currently serves will go instead to POs in Upper Clapton Road and Dalston Lane. The Chatsworth Road PO is also scheduled to close, with its 1,500 customers going instead either to the one in Homerton High Street or the one in Rushmore Road. The third on the hit list is the Wilton Way. It too serves about 1,500 customers per week, and the Post Office's document says half of these will go to Dalston Lane and half to the PO in Mare Street (presumably the one on the Narroway part).

Dan's pressimistic conclusion is that, assuming the two offices nearest to him - Lower Clapton and Chatsworth - close, the one nearest to him will the Rushmore Road one, whose customer numbers will have increased by about 750 to 2,250. His next nearest will be the Dalston Lane, whose customer numbers will have risen from 2,000 per week to 3,500 as a result of closures elsewhere. He has also worked out how these customers numbers relate to the numbers of customer windows available at the three PO's where demand would be concentrated:

Rushmore Road: 1125 customers per week per desk (a 125% increase)

Dalston Lane: 1750 customers per week per desk (a 250% increase)

Hackney Mare Street: 1310 customers per week per desk (a 160% increase)

Result? Longer distances for many customers to travel, and longer queues and waits for everyone. Dan would like the Post Office to save its Lower Clapton Road and Wilton Way branches from closure, not least because he cannot see how Dalston Lane will cope. How about you?

Comments

[Krankenhaus]

Dave glad to see your comments on the post office closures but not sure where you get your info from... Dalston Lane PO closed in the last round of cuts leaving Wilton Way PO which is marked for closure this time, nearest PO to Chats Rd would be Homerton High Street

[Dave Hill]

Hello Krankenhaus. As you can tell from the post, the information is not from me, but from Dan. I'll ask him to double check.

[felix]

There were 2 POs in Dalston Lane....the one nearer to Sir Michael Rosen closed indeed. The other is close by Hackney Downs station and is alive and well. I don't hold out much hope on any consultation...everything seems sealed as ever. Do read Jenni Russell's brilliant article in the Guardian of 5 March. Funny old business, when the shareholder( Labour Govt) has no interest in its own company and even takes work away from it to make sure it goes down the tubes and international competition picks up the prize. I still miss having 2 POs withing about 150 metres of each other at Clapton Pond, a brilliant luxury at the time.

[Dave Hill]

Felix, I knew we could depend on you!

[felix]

Dave, forgot to include the link to the excellent Jenni R's article...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/mar/05/post.publicservices?gusrc=rss&feed=networkfront

[Reuben]

Please sign the petition to save the post offices! Hundreds already have, but we need to get as many people as possible behind this campaign if we're going to save them

www.hackneylibdems.org.uk/postoffices

[rosemarie]

Already the queues for the post office in the Narroway snake down towards Percy Ingles. And what with the buses bumper to bumper, and yet more queuing for the post office, it'll be a wonder if no-one ends up under the wheels of those buses.