The following analysis contains data for the devices at Westdaw, S.C Fuller, Dorking Sports Centre, The Optical Studio, Calliope, Bernard Marcus, Renee’s Health Food Store, Dorking Light & Shade and Westcott & Williams.
- Nationally, footfall started to decline throughout October with the number of COVID- 19 cases rising resulting in the introduction of more local lockdowns UK and tightening of restrictions.
- Dorking fell into the ‘Tier 1’ risk alert level with the lowest number of restrictions in place, however the town centre still experienced a general decline in footfall in October.
- With the second national lockdown starting in November, further and more dramatic declines in footfall will occur with all non-essential retail, restaurants and pubs closing and the population once again being told to stay at home wherever possible.
Weekly footfall profile
- Figure 1 shows how weekly footfall has changed from October 2019 to 2020.
- Footfall is now higher on the weekend than in 2019 and slightly lower on each of the weekdays.
- With workers once again being encouraged to work from home where possible, the flow of workers has fallen in October 2020 which will have contributed to the reduced weekday footfall.
Overall footfall volume
- The figure above shows the weekly footfall throughout October for the active footfall devices.
- There have been a mix of devices that have seen increases and decreases in footfall in October, however the general trend across all devices (as seen in Figure 3) shows a general decline with a slight uplift in week 44.
- The device at Renee’s Health Food Store saw the largest decline in October which has contributed to the overall decline in footfall in the town centre.
Week-on-week change in footfall
- Figure 4 shows the volatile nature of footfall across the different locations in Dorking town centre.
- Figure 5 shows that in every week in October bar week 44, there was a consistent week-on-week decline across the devices.
- As the second lockdown will take place in November, the colder weather could see footfall drop more dramatically than it did during the first lockdown in the Spring.
