COVID restrictions led to deserted city centres but there is cause for hope
COVID has significantly affected the way we work, live, and socialise. To control the rising cases when COVID started spreading around the world, governments imposed restrictions closing offices and business. With people working from home and only essential businesses open, the usual-bustling streets became empty and appeared like a scene out of a dystopian movie. The extent and the length of restrictions varied around the world, but it disrupted people’s lives everywhere.
Melbourne is no exception which has endured a series of long and tough lockdowns. At the time of writing this article in September 2021, Melbourne was in its 6th lockdown. The first set of restrictions were announced in March 2020. Between then and now, there have been periods when the restrictions were eased to varying degrees and people could socialise, work in offices with some capacity limits or go out shopping. Having been to the city during the eased restrictions, I was surprised to see the ubiquitous ‘For Lease’ and ‘Closed’ signs at former cafes and small businesses. To understand how COVID restrictions impacted the pedestrian traffic and how quickly the pedestrian density rebounded after the ease of restrictions, I looked at the hourly pedestrian density available on the City of Melbourne Open Data website¹.
Melbourne has 80 sensors monitoring pedestrian density in the central business district (CBD) and the surrounding areas. For the analysis, I grouped these sensors into ten locations and further categorised them into two groups:
1. Office Areas: These include four locations: CBD, CBD — East, Docklands and Southbank. They have a high concentration of office buildings.
2. Other Areas: These include the remaining six locations. They include a mix of university, office, and residential areas.
Here is a map of all the pedestrian density sensors in Melbourne².
Since I wanted to understand the macro trend, I grouped the data to calculate the daily total pedestrian density and ignored the hourly fluctuations. I calculated the daily average pedestrian density for weekdays and weekend in 2019 and analysed the percentage change in the daily pedestrian density January 2020 onwards compared to the daily average pedestrian density in 2019.
Figure 1 below shows the pedestrian density trends in CBD, CBD — East, Docklands and Southbank from January 2020.
As expected, the pedestrian density dropped significantly at all locations around March 2020 when the first set of restrictions were announced. The pedestrian traffic was 80% lower than the pre-pandemic levels across CBD, CBD — East and Southbank. The drop in Docklands was slightly lower perhaps due to larger residential population which was still going to the supermarket or going out for exercise. Except for a slight rebound in June — July 2020, the pedestrian density remained low until November 2020 when it started to rise again. However, it remained lower than the pre-covid times. This is expected as the easing of restrictions was gradual and there were still restrictions on density caps both in the offices and restaurants. Since November 2020, there have been multiple rebounds and dips as Melbourne went through multiple lockdowns.
From the start of the pandemic till the end of July 2021, the pedestrian density trends have followed a similar pattern especially in CBD, CBD — East and Southbank. However, there are some interesting points of difference.
1. CBD — East has been the slowest to rebound compared to other areas. Its weekday pedestrian density has not increased beyond 50% of its pre-pandemic levels.
2. The weekend pedestrian density is almost back to normal in Docklands. This could be due to the higher number of residential apartment buildings in the area. Even though people are working from home, they are likely to get out and spend more time outdoors on the weekends.
3. CBD has been the quickest to rebound compared to other areas. Since November 2020, CBD has seen 3 peaks where the pedestrian density has been higher than -25% mark. It has only happened once for Southbank and not yet for Docklands or CBD — East.
These four locations have high density of offices. Let’s see whether other areas follow similar trends.
Figure 2 below shows the pedestrian density trends in Queen Victoria Market, Melbourne Central, Southern Cross Station, Carlton, University of Melbourne and RMIT from January 2020.
Like the office areas, the pedestrian density dropped significantly at all locations around March 2020 when the first set of restrictions were announced. There are similarities in the timing of rebounds and dips but there are quite a few differences among these locations.
1. In terms of percentage change, ‘Southern Cross Station’ and ‘Queen Victoria Market’ are the worst affected locations. Since the pandemic began, the pedestrian density is still 50% lower than the pre-pandemic levels during any of the rebounds.
2. Both RMIT and Carlton saw the highest rebound rates once the restrictions eased in November 2020. Surprisingly, the pedestrian density rose above the pre-pandemic levels despite some level of restrictions in place. In-person learning resuming at RMIT and opening of hospitality venues on Lygon Street, Carlton could have contributed to these high rebound rates. Also, both Carlton and areas around RMIT have high residential population which explains the quick rebounds and dips as the restrictions were eased and tightened respectively.
3. RMIT and University of Melbourne had significant increase in pedestrian density around both March 2020 and March 2021 due to the semester start dates³,⁴.
COVID has impacted significantly how people move in different parts of the city. It is interesting to see how certain areas have been impacted more than the others. Among the ten locations analysed, CBD — East, Queen Victoria Market and Southern Cross Station seem to be the worst affected locations while the others have recovered at varying rates.
COVID has forced businesses to adapt to employees working remotely. Universities had to move to a world of online learning and lectures. The retail sector had to setup or improve their online shopping experience so that people could shop online as they couldn’t visit the stores. Once enough population has been vaccinated and COVID brought under control, restrictions will ease. People will head back to the offices, in-person learning will resume, and people will head to the shops but some of the changes brought on by the pandemic are here to stay. Remote work has become more acceptable and going forward, working from home 1–2 days a week might become the norm. We might see more people shopping online and fewer physical retail stores. Some universities might adopt a more hybrid approach towards learning. These changes will obviously affect how people move around the city. Locations which are less prone to these changes, will probably recover quicker than the others. While other locations might take longer, I am hopeful that they will eventually recover, and the bustling streets will again be a common sight.
References:
2. I didn’t consider the sensors in North Melbourne, Kensington, and Princes Hill for the analysis.
4. https://students.unimelb.edu.au/your-course/manage-your-course/key-dates
