Would it be a better have have restrictions by postcode rather than local council or health board areas?

[adrock1976]

Following on from my post in the Scotland Covid thread (see https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...9-restrictions-07-10-2020.209983/post-4869742)

As North Lanarkshire has mainly seen a rise in cases in the Motherwell, Bellshill, Coatbridge, and Airdrie areas, it does seem a bit harsh for residents of Cumbernauld and Kilsyth to be included in the now Tier/Level 4 restrictions.

Nobody who I have met while out with the dog, visiting the local convenience store, or in the town centre has had coronavirus or displayed any symptoms. As both Cumbernauld and Kilsyth have low to medium density residential housing with plenty of green spaces, this may have played a part in keeping the R rate down.

I would like to mention that both Cumbernauld and Kilsyth have never been a part of Lanarkshire (county). Before the days of Strathclyde Regional Council, Kilsyth was in Stirlingshire and Cumbernauld was in Dunbartonshire, hence how Cumbernauld and Kilsyth District Council came into being as a part of Strathclyde Regional Council.

Perhaps rather than having restrictions by health board or local council, maybe it should be done by postcode?

For example, if there are high cases in the Solihull MBC (Metropolitan Borough Council) area in the West Midlands (I'm originally from the West Midlands), but those high outbreaks of new cases are in the Chelmsley Wood area, it would be seem as harsh for those who reside in Meriden or the rest of the MBC area, hence my reasoning for how restrictions should be done by postcode.

What are other forum members thoughts?

 

[Bantamzen]

Following on from my post in the Scotland Covid thread (see https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...9-restrictions-07-10-2020.209983/post-4869742)




For example, if there are high cases in the Solihull MBC (Metropolitan Borough Council) area in the West Midlands (I'm originally from the West Midlands), but those high outbreaks of new cases are in the Chelmsley Wood area, it would be seem as harsh for those who reside in Meriden or the rest of the MBC area, hence my reasoning for how restrictions should be done by postcode.

What are other forum members thoughts?

Restriction by postcodes would be totally impracticable, there are plenty of places where postcodes differ by side of street let alone areas.

 

[duncanp]

Restriction by postcodes would be totally impracticable, there are plenty of places where postcodes differ by side of street let alone areas.

Including where I live.

If the restrictions in level 4 areas of Scotland applied where I live, I could be fined for crossing the street where I live.

However you determine the level of restrictions to be applied in a particular area, you have to have specified criteria for moving that area up and down the levels of restrictions. This is what is lacking at the moment.

 

[jtuk]

Saying how restrictions should be arranged is missing the point about the lack of need for restrictions

 

[NorthOxonian]

In theory I agree, and indeed that was the approach taken in Leicester way back in July. It'd be especially useful in large unitary authorities such as Northumberland, where one part of the authority is very urban and has very high rates, and the other part is much more rural and has consistently seen lower rates.

In practice there'd be a number of pitfalls. Both the fact postcode boundaries are often illogical (as mentioned above), but also in communicating restrictions. It's much easier to say "Restrictions in X-shire and Y city" than to specify exactly where in each.

 

[WelshBluebird]

it would be seem as harsh for those who reside in Meriden or the rest of the MBC area

Wherever you drawer the lines there will be some people whom it is deemed as "harsh" for.
In terms of postcodes - do you mean specific postcodes? In which case that would get way out of hand way too quickly because of the sheer number.
If you just mean part of a postcode (e.g. BS2) - then I think that is still too many to be practical but you also end up with exactly the same harshness you want to get rid off purely because of how postcode areas are defined. If you look at maps of them - there is basically hardly any logic to a lot of postcode areas. Much of what we have today is because of historical accidents if nothing else. As an example, the one I mentioned just now, BS2, isn't even a continuous area!

 

[adrock1976]

Wherever you drawer the lines there will be some people whom it is deemed as "harsh" for.
In terms of postcodes - do you mean specific postcodes? In which case that would get way out of hand way too quickly because of the sheer number.
If you just mean part of a postcode (e.g. BS2) - then I think that is still too many to be practical but you also end up with exactly the same harshness you want to get rid off purely because of how postcode areas are defined. If you look at maps of them - there is basically hardly any logic to a lot of postcode areas. Much of what we have today is because of historical accidents if nothing else. As an example, the one I mentioned just now, BS2, isn't even a continuous area!

It was the first part of postcodes I was referring to e.g. BD23 is part of the Bradford (Yorkshire) postcode area, but this one is for Skipton if I am making sense here.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Ever seen the size of the SK postcode area?

 

[greyman42]

The YO postcode, which is York includes Scarborough and Bridlington.

 

[SteveM70]

In my opinion it would replace one set of perceived weaknesses with another broadly similar set, and add in a level of complexity in how to communicate to the public. The very act of drawing a boundary means that somebody or somewhere is just one side of the boundary, and someone or somewhere else is just the other side.

Neither system addresses the inevitable issues where the people of one settlement may use a larger nearby town in a different county or postcode for most of their services. For example Portsmouth and Cornholme (between Todmorden and Burnley, just the Todmorden side of Copy Pit if you want it in railway terms) lean heavily to Burnley. It’s the nearest town with “big shops”. But it’s in a different county and a different postcode area.

And to make it really complicated....I live in Calderdale, which is part of West Yorkshire, but my post town (Todmorden) has a Lancashire address. I also have an Oldham postcode and a Rochdale phone number - both Greater Manchester.

 

[rcro]

NP16, NP25, HR3 amongst others could get a bit complicated if you try to drill down to regions that don't correspond to local administration. Whatever granularity gets chosen for restrictions, statistically 50% of each area will have infection rates below the average for that region as a whole... Rather than try to reinvent the wheel you work with what you can reasonably administer and communicate (and for legal enforcement where defined, police jurisdictions do correspond to LA areas because of council tax precepts). To be truthful, for a communication perspective there would be more logic in simplifying arbitrary borders by combining adjacent urban LAs rather than splitting down further - boundaries such as Bristol/South Glos feel a bit "artificial" as Bristol has expanded. What we need is something that is simple to understand, clearly justified and proportionate - it's easier said than done!

 

[Llanigraham]

Ever seen the size of the SK postcode area?

Try the SY postcode, that goes from Shrewsbury to Machynlleth! That's 2 countries as well!!

 

[david1212]

There will always be discrepancies and anomalies at the boundary of any system but for e.g. Northumberland there ought to be a differential between the urban areas at the south and the rural areas. Back at the end of September a work colleague was on holiday there based near Bamburgh and found the area very quiet. He said it was illogical for the restrictions to be more stringent then the urban area where he lives and for there to be so many business with significant dependency on tourism closed.

Picking up on Solihull in the first post Henley-in-Arden over the county boundary in Warwickshire has the Birmingham area based postcode B95 nxx. The system would still work if considered more appropriate to have the same restrictions as CV37 nxx which is Stratford-upon-Avon and the district council area rather than Solihull.

 

[sheff1]

Restriction by postcodes would be totally impracticable, there are plenty of places where postcodes differ by side of street let alone areas.

Well we already have different restrictions on opposite sides of streets. I am amazed there has not been major investigation into how & why "the science" changes, sometimes quite markedly, in a matter of a few metres in Saltney for example.

 

[Ian Cunningham]

I think council areas are probably the smallest level you can go to - everybody knows what council they are in and council areas are easily identifiable for outsiders.
Unless you work for Royal Mail you probably don't have a clue about postcode areas - they are also not always logical: we are in EH21 but are bordered by EH15, 22, 32 & 33 but not 20
It was noticeable that ScotGov started using Health Board Areas for a short period before reverting to council areas with the Level system. The general opinion seemed to be the areas were too large and who the hell knew where the health board boundaries were anyway!

 

[NoMorePacers]

The only issue with council boundaries I believe is where a city council limits undercuts the wider urban area. Anecdotally, Hull is a good example of this. So in this instance, it would more than likely lead to rather patchy and conflicting restrictions being put into place.

 

[Harpers Tate]

I'd have chosen Postcode prefix (eg BD23) and the level. And in terms of communication of restrictions I would have created a matrix of
- where you normally live (postcode prefix) on one axis
- where you go or intend to go on the other axis, whether it's the same postcode prefix or another
and a "restriction level" at the intersect which you then look up to see what you can and can't do while you are there. It could be fairly simply contructed as a website enquiry producing an answer list. Input "home" postcode; input destination postcode; get list of applicable restrictions.

 

[OneOffDave]

You could probably determine restrictions based on Lower Layer Super Output Areas as that's one way the statistics are produced but outside of people interested in statistics and demographics very few people know what they are. Having too much granularity can lead to the published data identifying individuals if there aren't many cases/people in an area. If you looked at the stats by age, gender and ethnicity for an area, where there aren't many cases you might be able to work out it's a white woman aged 40-45 and if there are only two of those in the area then you can work out who the individual is.
The delivery of the response is usually based on lower tier local authorities as that's where the front line public health and environmental health services are delivered. Using postcodes at the XX9 level may mean that chunks of the same authority have different levels of restriction so there would need to be multiple sets of regulations and advice for the authority to have to provide. Travel to work areas are also considered in determining areas so the commuter 'hinterland' for an urban area may get restrictions at the same time as significant numbers travel from it into the urban area and mix with others from across the commuting footprint

 

[Skimpot flyer]

Ever seen the size of the SK postcode area?

Which includes Buxton (SK17), a place in the county of Derbyshire. Stockport, from which the SK o postcode prefix is derived, is of course in Cheshire.
There are many other examples of this kind of anomaly

 

[SteveM70]

Two of the main complaints about the restrictions so far (I’m ignoring the wider “are they even necessary” question as that’s not for this debate) have been that they’re over complicated and difficult to communicate in a simple way that joe public can understand

some of these suggestions would just make that worse. Boundaries need to be defined in a way the average bod can understand and recognise and rules need to be simple enough to communicate in three sentences or less (but not in three words as is current government fashion)

 

[island]

Restriction by postcodes would be totally impracticable, there are plenty of places where postcodes differ by side of street let alone areas.

Except it worked fine for the Leicester lockdown in July when the area was defined by postcode.

 

[DB]

The YO postcode, which is York includes Scarborough and Bridlington.

And BD. Even just BD23 (Skipton) stretches quite a way up unto the Dales and includes Grassington.

The postcodes also don't follow local authority boundaries - e.g. Ilkely is within the Bradford city boundary but has a Leeds postcode.

 

[ExCoquitlam]

Local councils are providing financial support to businesses within their areas. It's a lot simpler for them if they pay the same grant to everyone in the area rather than having to pay business X in one postcode a different amount from business Y in a neighbouring postcode.