Security fears and public transport warnings during Olympics appear to have scared people away from capital.

In England, Piccadilly Circus is an age-old metaphor for crowds and traffic jams, but during the Olympics there are strangely far fewer people in the city.

Londoners seemed to have been spooked by security or traffic warnings, more apparently leaving the city than there have been tourists arriving.

The upside to the problem is that hotel prices have gone down, so for some domestic tourists last-minute cheap deals are available.

Al Jazeera’s Laurence Lee reports from London.