We ran a visitor count on two days in July. Twelve volunteers manned a succession of two-hour slots from 7am to 7pm on Sunday 18th and Wednesday 21st July. The counting was all carried out from the point where the footbridge path from the park and ride meets the main riverside route. Further number crunching will be carried out later, but here are a few of the more notable results:
- A total of 1451 people were recorded over 24 hours spread across two days.
- Only 10% of visitors were children, the proportion falling to just 7% on Wednesday.
- Most of the visitors were coming out from Canterbury (67%), as expected, with 29% coming over the footbridge, and just 4% walking across the field from the Whitehall Road direction.
- Adding the two days’ figures together, the busiest two-hour period was 5-7pm, with 307 visitors. The busiest single-day period was also at 5-7pm, with 211 visitors on Wednesday.
- 5% of visitors were dog-walking.
- 54% of visitors were walking, 32% cycling and 9% running. The remaining 5% were on electric scooters, mobility scooters and skateboards and a unicycle!
We’re hugely grateful to the volunteers who helped collect this useful information – many thanks to all.