In the wake of Saturday’s terrorist attack in London, the capital’s tourism industry is now endeavouring to assess what impact the atrocity may have on a sector that supports 700,000 jobs and is worth some £36 billion per year.

It may take some time for trends in prospective London visitors’ behaviours to become clear, but some in the industry have looked to Paris as a precedent. After the November 2015 terrorist attack, the number of domestic and international tourists visiting the French capital dropped by approximately 30 per cent. It would not be remiss to think the same might happen to London.

The London Eye, which in terms of visitor numbers is one of Europe's most popular attractions Credit: Getty Images

That prediction is however contested by Laura Citron, CEO of the capital’s tourism board London & Partners: “At this stage it is not possible to predict the impact on the tourism industry but we do know that in the two months following the Westminster attack, travel agent bookings to London were up 6.7 per cent.”

London’s robust performance over the last year can in part be attributed to the post-Brexit fall in the value of sterling making the city more affordable to foreign visitors. Sterling dropped by around 15 per cent against the currencies of the UK’s major trading partners following the referendum vote to leave the EU and more than 2.8m overseas residents visited the UK in January, up 11 per cent on the same month in 2016, the Office for National Statistics said.

The capital’s increased popularity, however, forms part of a longer-term trend rather than a spiked response to favourable fluctuations in the exchange rate. Last year London welcomed a record 19.1m overseas visits to the city and is now welcoming 25 per cent more overseas visits, compared to five years ago - itself a particularly notable year with the 2012 Olympic Games being hosted in Stratford.

The manager of one Knightsbridge luxury hotel told me today he remained optimistic about the city’s enduring high popularity. His hotel has so far noticed no impact from the terrorist attack at all, with no increase in the number of cancellations or a dip in the volume of booking enquiries. Data from Forward Keys, used by London & Partners and Visit Britain to monitor travel-agent bookings to London and the UK, has recently also provided indications that interest in the country hadn’t dipped as a consequence of the atrocities on Westminster Bridge and in Manchester. As of May 27, two months after the former attack and five days after the latter, visits to the UK were up 11 per cent year on year.

But while few in London’s tourism industry have publicly suggested the capital will suffer a long-term degradation in its popularity due to these events, there have been some indicators that confidence in the sector has dipped. Travel Weekly reports that shares across the sector fell this week, with Merlin - operator of the London Eye and Madame Tussauds - dropping 13p to 524p and British Airways owner International Airlines Group dropping 15.5p to 592p.

The British Museum Credit: Getty Images

One of the few companies to confirm to Telegraph Travel that they had seen a significant hit to their business in the wake of the UK terrorist attacks is HenHeaven, which organises hen parties and counts London as its most popular destination. According to CEO Rob Hill, they “have seen a 60 per cent drop in London traffic on the site…[though] we are expecting this to recover after not too long”.

While businesses nationwide will be keen to assess the commercial impact of these terrible events, London & Partners’ Laura Citron is urging tourists to continue to support the city: “Londoners and visitors are resilient and we are confident that tourists will stand by the city and our values. Today, London is up and running as normal, and it is great to see people out enjoying our unbeatable array of museums, restaurants, shops and theatres. Some 700,000 Londoners rely on tourism for their livelihoods and visitors have never been more important or more welcome here.”