Market in full and happy swing
When local councils try to ‘improve’ an area, you can be certain disaster will follow. And when they try to force these ‘improvements’ through during peak holiday times, you can be sure they are trampling over transparancy.
This council has some serious issues to address and should not be tampering with Portobello Market. The market has been a successful magnet for decades and should be protected as a community asset.
Dear All
Summer has arrived. Many neighbours have left London. As happens every summer, RBKC’s plan to destroy Portobello Market returns. While we’re engrossed in Wimbledon, RBKC has resurrected its master plan to “accidentally” destroy the Market – by banning, or hugely reducing, parking.
This issue has a considerable history. There are no prizes for guessing exactly who is currently behind this; nor why. Cllr Taylor Smith has told us he used to run ‘commercial’ markets. A few years ago an estate agent told a street trader that the traders would soon be gone, because RBKC had done a deal with the gin palace and local property owners, to replace the market stalls with restaurant tables & chairs. No one had considered the traders’ legal status. Suffice it to say that: the law protects them. So RBKC yet again intends to destroy Market parking by lying about:
a) Shopkeepers’ ‘sightlines’
b) Tourist overcrowding
c) Multiple “public consultations”
d) Now, an 80+% chance: security.
This is RBKC’s position. As ever; get rid of the parking; get rid of the Market. Job done. Then RBKC can follow through with it’s long established plan to replace Market with restaurant/pub/cafe/bar tables and chairs in the street a la Covent Garden. Except Portobello Road is not in the West End. It’s an ugly little back street off Ladbroke Grove. It’s famous only because the Market has made it famous. Without the Market; it’s just a back street.
a) Market shops have always been blocked by stalls to the east and parking to the west. RBKC has systematically sold off 80% of traders’ stores. Street traders can no longer afford to live nearby. Those wanting perfect sight lines can go to All Saints Rd. It’s beautiful and rents much lower – because there’s no footfall.
b) Despite protests, for the last 10+ years, the Market Office has promoted Portobello Market as a major tourist attraction – not a place to buy staples. We understood the Met police annual footfall figure of 3 million. Yet in 2023, RBKC/Cllr Faulks published a report “Live, Work Learn” claiming a 6 million footfall per annum. RBKC took no measurements. It has never published a report on the financial value of the Market to the area. On the back of Cllr Faulks’ report; property owners and estate agents colluded to sell leases to a score of new restaurants, bars, cafes etc. with the promise of endless outdoor seating for their customers – in the area formerly used by the Market. At no time did RBKC consult the Borough Solicitor. The street traders advised Cllr Taylor Smith on the law.
c) There is no need to plough through the saga of RBKC’s multiple public consultations on Portobello, over the years. They focused on persuading residents/shopkeepers/visitors to condemn the Market to the dustbin of history. They all failed. This last exercise has cost £100,000 and elicited the same response: “Leave Portobello Market Alone!” Nothing more has been heard for months.
d) RBKC is now rushing to obey 20 years’ overdue “new” security requirements regarding the Market and its visitors. Meanwhile, the identical risks to RBKC’s hundreds of roadway diners, are ignored.
Please note: RBKC managed to get its dangerously low ’security’ blocks of something other than concrete, installed without serious trouble. Now RBKC is ready to rid Portobello of Market parking. No parking; no Market – because over the last 20 years RBKC has sold off 80 – 90% of the Market stores. Five hundred street traders will lose their livelihoods. All this; so a few councillors; multiple property owners plus estate agents can make more money! The restaurants/pubs//bars/cafes will continue to mostly lose money; because rents etc are huge and tourists mostly young, with little to spend.
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> This is urgent. This is serious. Please fully engage with the issues.
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Local Resident
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