Rediscovering cultural tourism: Cultural regeneration in ...gala.gre.ac.uk/10656/1/Kennell_2011.pdftourism function or ‘regeneration’ where a more holistic approach to recovery

Rediscovering cultural tourism:Cultural regeneration in seasidetownsAccepted following review: 18th November, 2010

James Kennellis a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Marketing, Events and Tourism in the Business School at the University of Greenwich.His current research is into the sociocultural impacts of regeneration, with a specific focus on seaside towns and small urbanareas. James has wide experience of working in social regeneration and community development in the south-east of Englandand has carried out consultancy projects for local and regional bodies in the areas of cultural development and regeneration.

Abstract British seaside towns have been subject to numerous attempts at regeneration

and rebranding since the collapse of traditional seaside tourism began in the late 1970s.

This paper reviews contemporary approaches to seaside regeneration and demonstrates

that cultural regeneration strategies are becoming increasingly prevalent in this area.

The validity of transferring city-based models of cultural development to these smaller

urban areas is critiqued. The history of cultural investment in seaside towns is high-

lighted to show how current approaches to cultural regeneration, while presented as

novel, are in fact a resumption of earlier strategies of cultural tourism development. This

heritage of cultural development provides a resource for seaside cultural regeneration

which may allow development of this type to avoid the negative social impacts often

associated with cultural regeneration in cities.

Keywords: seaside, cultural regeneration, cultural tourism, regeneration

INTRODUCTIONBeatty and Fothergill refer to seaside townsas the ‘least understood of Britain’s‘‘problem’’ areas’1 and, despite the strongpublic awareness of the decline of theBritish seaside resort, there has been littleacademic research into the contemporaryproblems facing these formerly busydestinations that can usefully be applied intheir future development.2–4 Generally,coastal resorts have been under-researched,despite being the ‘main tourism destinationfor many holidaymakers’;5 most researchthat has taken place has a regional focus oris limited to narrow economic and/orhistorical perspectives. Seaside townscontribute significantly to the visitoreconomy in the UK: Shaw and Colesdemonstrate that domestic tourists take 25.5million seaside holidays in the UK,

spending around £4.7bn, and 270 millionday trips generating £3.1bn spend.6

The tourism industry in Britain’s seasidetowns has been in decline since the mid-1970s when increasing competition fromnewly developed holiday destinations andchanges in the dynamics of the tourismmarket made the traditional week-longseaside family holiday obsolete. As in otherone-industry towns, this period of globaleconomic restructuring left, in manyseaside destinations, a legacy ofunemployment, social problems, outdatedinfrastructure and redundant urban spaces.The regeneration response to the e!ects ofthis decline over the last twenty years hasinvolved attempts to reposition thesetowns within the tourism marketplacethrough a process of rebranding andproduct development. A combination of

James Kennell30 Park Row,London SE10 9LS, UK

e-mail:[email protected]

Journal of Town & City Management Vol. 1, 4 364–380 # Henry Stewart Publications 1756-9538 (2011)364

geography, heritage and economicstructures has left most seaside towns withno realistic alternative to tourismdevelopment as a strategy for revitalisationbut, as yet, and with some notableexceptions, no successful new models fortourism have been produced for towns thatwere at the forefront of the developmentof modern tourism. Pre-eminent amongcontemporary approaches to seasideregeneration has been the strategy ofcultural regeneration, and this paperprovides a critical overview of thisphenomenon, concentrating on thedi!erences between impacts of culturalregeneration in large urban centres and thesmaller urban areas of seaside towns.

DEFINING SEASIDE TOWNSWalton’s historical study of British seasidetowns rejects the notion that there can beone definition of its subject: ‘We aredealing with a recognisable and distinctivekind of town, but with as many variationsas a hawkweed or burnet-moth.’7 Waltonalso asserts that, despite the diversity oftowns and experiences that make up theseaside, ‘the British seaside resort retains arobust identity, which in turn reinforces itsimportance as a subject for investigationand analysis’.8 The seaside town emergedthrough a defined historical process, andthe specific spatial, economic and culturalcharacteristics of the towns as one findsthem today can be explained through theiremergence, along with the industrialisationof England, the emergence of an a"uentmiddle class and the way in which thesefactors combined to allow for theconstruction of the seaside resort as acultural phenomenon in the 19th century.Beatty and Fothergill’s9 study into the

economies of seaside towns points out thata list of every town with some claim toseaside resort status would include 120towns, some of which are more accuratelydescribed as ports, industrial towns orresidential areas. Beatty and Fothergill

apply three criteria in their study in orderto identify ‘seaside towns’, which

1. are seaside resorts, rather than just alldeveloped areas by the sea — thisexcludes towns whose main function isas a port or industrial centre

2. are significant urban areas in their ownright, rather than suburbs of largersettlements or sections of a settlementthat happen to be by the sea

3. had a population of over 8,000 in 1971,the starting point for their own researchand a way of concentrating theirresearch in large seaside towns.

This is the definition of ‘seaside towns’ thathas been used in this study. The term‘seaside towns’ is used in this paper inpreference to ‘coastal towns’, ‘seasideresorts’ or ‘coastal resorts’ to emphasise thespecific cultural factors at play in theconstruction of the British urban seasideenvironment, as a peculiar construction ofthe ‘tourist gaze’.10

THE DECLINE OF SEASIDETOWNS IN BRITAINAlthough Walton claims that the ‘death ofthe British seaside had been prematurelyanticipated and greatly exaggerated’,11

sources generally agree that, from the mid-1970s, British seaside resorts have been in aperiod of decline. As Urry points out, inBritain, tourism has become a hugelyimportant industry but, paradoxically,seaside towns have not shared in thiscontemporary growth. Urry points tomainly cultural factors in explaining thisdiscrepancy, locating expressions of culturalchange in:

— de-industrialisation of cities and towns,stimulating less of a need for escape tothe seaside;

— growth of city/urban tourism as acompetitor to traditional ‘resort-based’tourism;

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— proliferation of urban leisure centresand sports facilities, replicating andimproving upon seaside leisurefunctions;

— recolonisation of the seaside by theupper classes as a means of distinction,re-establishing pre-industrial tourismpatterns in seaside destinations.12

These cultural shifts were not the result ofone single change, but of a matrix ofchange whose e!ects were seen in manyindustrial sectors and which broughttogether specific industrial failures andmacro-economic shifts, tied to therestructuring of global capitalism astechnological and political changes cametogether in contemporary globalisation. In1974, the world experienced the firstinternational oil crisis, following whichdomestic tourism fell and remaineddepressed until the late 1980s, part of ageneral economic slump in Britain and inwestern economies more generally. Thiswas compounded in the case of tourism bythe emergence of overseas resorts ‘wheretourists could find a mixture of the familiarand the exotic, an echo on a grander scaleof what the English seaside was like forholiday makers in the 19th century’.13 Likethe domestic ship-building, automobilemanufacturing and coal mining industries,seaside tourism in the UK did not adaptquickly to the new globalised reality.

SEASIDE REGENERATIONRegeneration is an approach todevelopment that seeks to respond to urbandecline through a variety of techniques, allof which have the aim of arresting declineand promoting sustainable, long-term,positive change within a specific area. Mostauthors agree that regeneration hasemerged as a policy/practical construct inresponse to the restructuring of the globaleconomy in the last thirty years and thenegative consequences of the attendant de-industrialisation and socio-economic change

in western nations, which has been feltmost keenly in urban areas.14–19 Robertsdefines regeneration as ‘comprehensive andintegrated vision and action which leads tothe resolution of urban problems andwhich seeks to bring about a lastingimprovement in the economic, physical,social and environmental condition of anarea that has been subject to change’.20

Strategies of regeneration have beenexplicitly employed through the UK andEurope since the Second World War, whenthe need for physical reconstructionprovided an opportunity for thereconsideration of urban form in responseto changed economic and social conditions.In the UK, successive governments haveproduced regeneration and developmentframeworks which have given priorities todi!erent economic sectors, institutionalactors and policy outcomes. Recently, anumber of non-governmental organisationssuch as English Heritage,21 the BritishUrban Regeneration Association22 andsome local authorities (eg ShepwayCouncil23 and Worthing BoroughCouncil24) in the UK have started toconsider the future of a specifically seasideform of regeneration, but much of thiswork is local and specific, lackingconceptual frameworks or a strategicoverview of the issues involved.Central government has ‘consistently

failed’25 to involve itself in the regenerationof seaside towns, leaving it to quasi-NGOsand local authorities, which comparespoorly with other European governments,especially France and Spain. Localgovernment, however, has displayed asignificant commitment to seasideregeneration, which makes sense, as seasidetourism is mainly local-resource based. Theresponse to decline in seaside towns hasbeen variously described as ‘rejuvenation’where it relates to the re-establishment oftourism function or ‘regeneration’ where amore holistic approach to recovery isconsidered. Although the majority of


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northern European and someMediterranean resorts have beenresponding to decline since the 1980s, thereare only a ‘handful’ of studies into this,26

showing that e!orts focus primarily onproduct reorganisation and producttransformation.Despite much being done recently to

reposition British seaside resorts within thetourism market, little has changed,suggesting that attempting to manage thesupply and demand for seaside tourismthrough marketing initiatives and productdevelopment cannot be the sole solution tothe decline of seaside towns.27,28 Despitethis, the mono-industrial character ofseaside resorts means that decline in thetourism industry is simply not an optionfor the majority of seaside destinations.29

Because of this, new forms of tourism havebeen explored in seaside destinations,including conference/business tourism,educational tourism and, most recently,cultural tourism development strategies. Acontent analysis methodology has beenemployed to analyse the foci of regional

and local approaches to regeneration inseaside towns in Britain, with the results ofthis given in Tables 1 and 2. First, theapproach to seaside regeneration beingtaken in each region of the UK wasanalysed, and then a purposive sample ofseaside towns in each region was chosen.No towns from Wales, Northern Ireland orScotland were chosen, owing to the lack ofspecific seaside forms of regeneration at thistime.As shown in Tables 1 and 2, many

seaside towns are undergoing regenerationschemes that can be described as cultural, orwhich have specific cultural components.Carter54 argues that British seaside resorts

are turning to the creative industries forregeneration, and one can see that creativedevelopment55 is becoming the dominanttheme in contemporary British seasideregeneration. The Department for CultureMedia and Sport has announced a £45mfunding programme called ‘Sea Change’ tosupport cultural investments in seasideregeneration. The first £12m tranche offunding was awarded to Blackpool, Torbay

Table 1: Contemporary approaches to seaside regeneration at the regional level

Region/Nation Dominant approach RDA/responsible body

South West Mainly economic,a some physicalb and socialc SWRDAEast Midlands Social and economic EMDAYorkshire andthe Humber

Physical emphasis, some economic and social

East of England Diverse set of programmes in place with no core focusto seaside regeneration

EEDA

North East No overarching strategic framework for seasideregeneration

One North East

North West Mainly economic NWRDASouth East Cultural,d economic SEEDAWales Economic and physical Welsh AssemblyScotland No overarching strategic framework for seaside

regenerationScottish Assembly

N. Ireland No overarching strategic framework for seasideregeneration

Northern Ireland Assembly

a Economic regeneration strategies focus on re-establishing the conditions for successful capital accumulation in an area andtend to emphasise enterprise support and innovation funding.b Physical regeneration concentrates on the quality of the built environment and infrastructure projects.c Social regeneration has also been described in the literature as community regeneration, and is used here to refer to anapproach to regeneration that emphasises the role of the voluntary and community sector and in building grassrootsparticipation in the regeneration process.d See section on cultural regeneration, below, for an explanation of this term.Sources: Refs. 30–34.



and Dover in 2008. In the most recentfunding round, a further £12m has beenawarded:

— Southport: £4m to link an arts centre,library and gallery and to develop atheatre, museum and popular musicvenue;

— Bridlington: £3m for improvements tothe area around the refurbished RoyalHall and Spa theatre, as well asdeveloping Pembroke Gardens as anoutdoor performance space;

— Great Yarmouth: £3m to regenerate thehistoric quarter, including conversionof a grade 1 listed chapel into an artscentre;

— Hastings: £2m for an artist designedpiazza, performance space andcommunity centre.56

The most significant cultural investment inseaside towns, however, is taking place inthe south-east of England, where theaspiration is for seaside towns to become‘year-round cultural destinations’.57

Brighton in Sussex has rebranded itselfsuccessfully as a creative tourism destinationwith a vibrant creative industries sector:

‘We are now much more about culturethan candyfloss.’58 Whitstable on the NorthKent coast has been transformed from asmall fishing village to ‘an arty, foody,fashion hub’,59 in the main due to an influxof artists and creative industries over thelast fifteen years, an organic, gentrifyingchange on which local entrepreneurs andthe local authority have capitalised todevelop the town as a cultural tourismdestination. It is estimated that around£900,000 of public funds has been investedin regenerating Whitstable since 1990,attracting an additional £4.5m inpartnership funding. This has led to therestoration of over 350 buildings in thetown.60 Margate, in the Thanet sub-region,is receiving £25m of public funding for theconstruction of a contemporary art centre,which is planned to be the centrepiece ofthe cultural regeneration of the mostimportant of the Kentish seaside resorts. InFolkestone, a charitable trust is driving thecreative regeneration of the town, investing£20m in the development of a culturalquarter, as well as supporting theprogramming of cultural events such as anew international art biennial and investingsignificantly in education and business

Table 2: Contemporary approaches to seaside regeneration at the local level

Town Region Approach to regeneration

Morecambe North West Mixed, with an emphasis on social and housingBlackpool North West Economic, with a culture and entertainment focusSouthport North West Economic and socialBridlington Yorkshire and the Humber EconomicScarborough Yorkshire and the Humber Economic and socialCleethorpes Yorkshire and the Humber Mixed, with an emphasis on physical and economicWhitley Bay North East Economic at the sub-regional level, cultural focus to

Whitley Bay regenerationSkegness East of England EconomicSouthend East of England Mixed: economic, physical and culturalGreat Yarmouth East of England Economic and housingHastings and Bexhill South East Economic and socialFolkestone South East CulturalMargate South East CulturalWhitstable South East CulturalTorbay South West EconomicFalmouth South West Cultural and physicalWeston-super-Mare South West Economic and physical

Sources: Refs. 35–53.


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development in the town.61 In Bexhill onthe south coast, £6m has been invested inthe refurbishment of the De La WarrPavilion, a 1930s modernist constructionwhich has now been re-imagined as aleading contemporary arts space with theaim of serving ‘as a catalyst towards thewider ambitions for Bexhill, as the townbecomes an important centre for culturaltourism and a focus for sustainableeconomic tourism’.62

One can identify a contemporary trendfor seaside towns in the UK, all of whomare grappling with issues of regenerationand tourism development, to turn toinvestment in culture as the driver for theirregeneration strategy.

CULTURAL REGENERATIONWhile government motivations forregeneration in general and culture-ledregeneration in particular are sometimesdi#cult to discern, what is clear is thatthese projects are increasing in both scopeand frequency. As Evans notes

‘the creation of cultural flagships,architectural masterpieces and their(re)location in industrial districts, waterfrontsand depopulated downtown areas has notbeen paralleled since the Victorian civicbuilding and celebrations . . . cities have againembraced these politically and economicallyhigh-risk ventures.’63

Other writers have added to this withobservations that increased governmentspending on culture is predicated on thebelief that this will have impacts in otherpolicy areas such as crime andunemployment.64 Landry provides anotheravenue for governments keen to reviveareas that have su!ered from the decline inheavy industry and traditional patterns ofemployment in ‘The creative city’, whenhe describes regeneration processes in onesuch area: ‘The town saw that it had onlyone resource — its people: theirintelligence, ingenuity, aspirations,

motivations, imagination and creativity. Ifthese could be tapped, renewal andregeneration would follow.’65

In the context of urban regeneration,culture is defined broadly, but can involveelements or combinations of:

— architecture;— heritage buildings and attractions;— visual and performing arts;— festivals and events;— tourism development;— entertainment and leisure complexes;— ‘culture as a way of life’.66

Cultural regeneration and its associatedbenefits, such as creative industriesdevelopment and cultural tourism are nowa core part of urban redevelopment andcompetitiveness strategies,67–69 but this onlyserves to reinforce the already central roleof culture in the development and image ofurban areas. As Zukin points out, ‘Forseveral hundred years, visual representationsof cities have ‘‘sold’’ urban growth. Images,from early maps to picture postcards, havenot simply reflected real city spaces; insteadthey have been imaginative reconstructions— from specific points of view — of acity’s monumentality.’70

Evans highlights the potential for culturaldevelopment as a mode of action withinthe policy arena as one of the few availablestrategies that can engage with globalisationand ‘capture the twin goals of competitiveadvantage and quality of life’,71 helping toexplain its current popularity. Culturalregeneration o!ers policy makers a strategyfor integrating new visions of urbancompetitiveness and lifestyle indices of classand diversity and their relationship tourban vitality, such as those advanced byLandry and Florida. Florida’s work isprimarily concerned with growtheconomics and inter-city competitivenessand suggests that the key to the revival ordevelopment of cities is their ability toattract what he calls the ‘Creative Class’,



defined broadly as an economic group who‘add economic value through theircreativity’.72 This class includes knowledgeworkers, artists, symbolic analysts, thosewith high-tech skill sets and all thoseworking in the creative economy. Theindividuals grouped together in this classare seen as both producers and consumersof ‘the vibrancy of street life, cafe culture,cultural and creative activities’73 which,along with qualities of openness anddiversity and the combination of thenatural and built environment, provide thekey quality of place indicators for attractingthe ‘creative class’ and their high valueemployment and lifestyles to an area.Grodach and Loukaitou-Sideris74 reinforcethis perspective, highlighting how citiespursue cultural development strategies tocatalyse inward business investment,increase consumption by residents andtourists, improve city image and enhancelocal quality of life. This coming togetherof the strategies and tactics of culturalregeneration with a post-ideological,managerial, political outlook, as it hasdeveloped in the western economies andthose of the global north in the last twentyyears, helps to explain why strategies ofcultural regeneration that have only beenseen as viable in major urban centres areincreasingly being used by smaller urbanareas. These are as diverse as Huddersfield75

and Folkestone76 in the UK, Bergslagen inSweden77 and North Adams,Massachusetts, in the US.78 Some,however, have questioned the utility ofcultural regeneration outside the majormetropolitan centres at a functional level:

‘How do places that have lived withnotoriously negative images, anachronisticeconomies and numerous sites of industrialdecline, come to believe that at least a part oftheir economic recovery depends onsomething as elusive (or material) as the arts?’79

Historically, state spending on culturaldevelopment has been primarily concerned

with ideas such as self-expression, creativityand empowerment. Economic developmentis more concerned with the politics ofgrowth and capital accumulation. There isnot necessarily a link between these twopolicy modes and, although recent policydiscourse makes creativity more central ineconomic and social concerns, high-profilespending on culture may mask politicalissues of power and access to resources inthe interest of economic restructuring andgentrification;80 indeed, Florida notes thatsocio-economic inequality is highest in thevery creative epicentres of the US that hethinks should be emulated elsewhere.Criticisms have been made that culture-

led initiatives have not produced theeconomic benefits that they promised andthat the ‘trickle-down’ e!ect of theseprojects has failed to materialise.81 Culturalregeneration strategies claim to diversifyeconomies and also to rebrand cities andregions to make them more attractive totourists and businesses. While there is nodoubt that diversifying economies is onemeasurable outcome of culturalregeneration, concerns exist as to whetherthis is to the benefit of local communitiesor whether they only benefit ‘high-spending visitors’.82 In deprived areas, localpeople may not have the economic orcultural capital necessary to engage withcultural interventions, which often take theform of ‘cultural quarters’, which can beexclusive in both conception and price ifnot developed with local communities inmind.The rhetoric of using creative

development to make urban spacesavailable to all groups may be underminedby historical symbolic functions of sites asmarkers of social divisions, knowledge thatcontemporary planners and consultants findit hard to access.83 This may be ofparticular concern in the regeneration ofareas where economic restructuring has leftredundant former places of employmentand leisure. In addition to this, the public


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spaces created through these strategies oftendevelop ‘small places within the city as sitesof visual delectation . . . urban oases whereeveryone appears to be middle class’,84

making local patterns of inequalityinvisible, especially to tourists. On thewhole, the social impacts of culturalregeneration are under-researched andpoorly understood.85

SEASIDE CULTURALDEVELOPMENTThe above discussions give context to thecontemporary trend for culturalregeneration in seaside towns. There is aturn to culture taking place across Britishseaside destinations, where establishedmodels of cultural development from largeurban centres are being transplanted intothese smaller urban areas in an attempt torevive local tourism industries. The modesof cultural regeneration outlined abovehave been critiqued according to patternsof development in cities, and very littleresearch has been carried out todemonstrate the validity of theseframeworks in non-city settings. For thisreason, it is unclear whether the sameimpacts can be expected and whether thecriticisms of cultural regeneration strategieswill hold in seaside contexts.To explore the role of cultural

regeneration in seaside towns, it is necessaryto investigate the cultural context in whichcontemporary regeneration is taking place.Contemporary rhetoric paints these projectsas new and innovative, when they are infact a resumption of previous strategies ofgrowth through cultural tourism.Specific forms of seaside culture

developed in the 19th century as seasideresorts experienced their most dramaticperiod of growth, establishing themselvesalongside already popular cultural activitiessuch as theatre and dances. These included:Pierrots, white-faced clowns performingsongs and sketches on beaches andpromenades; the practice of ‘promenading’;

Punch and Judy shows and specific formsof cuisine such as rock, oysters and fish andchips. In addition to this many religiousand political groups would hold meetingsin seaside towns, taking advantage of thecaptive audience and a presumed permissiveattitude to stage events that might not havebeen possible in more regulated urbanareas.86

The huge social and cultural changes thatfollowed the First World War wereexpressed in an ‘explosion of leisure’,87

leading to a period of sustained growth inseaside towns as the holiday marketsopened up to new entrants and resortsdiversified to attract di!erentiated marketsegments, both inter- and intra-resort. Anincrease in public and private transportoptions increased consumer choice and,therefore, destination rivalry, acceleratingthis diversification. Although working-classvisitors often returned year after year to thesame resort and stayed in the sameaccommodation, a broadening middle classwas exercising greater concern over servicequality and leisure options. This growthcontinued into the 1930s, a decade whichsaw seaside leisure sector growth of 39 percent, exceeding all other UK industrialsectors.88

In 1921, the ‘Health and Pleasure ResortsAct’ was passed, allowing local authoritiesto fund resort advertising anddevelopments through the hire of deckchairs, beach tents, bathing machines andcharges for attractions, providing a revenuestream from cultural investment to fundresort growth investment in the holidayindustry which continued between thewars, with an average annual investment of£3–4m during the 1930s.89 Alongsideinvestment in accommodation, themajority of this investment was going intothe development of new and improvedleisure and cultural facilities.In this inter-war period, many new

leisure facilities were built, includingcinemas, amusement arcades, swimming



pools and pavilions, to cater for an increasein visitor numbers. Walton90 identifies adisinvestment in leisure facilities during the1950s, however, recording that theproceeds of growth were not beingreinvested to ensure the sustainabledevelopment of seaside resorts. This was toprove damaging in the long term, whenseaside towns began to face competitionfrom overseas and domestic leisuredestinations. In the 1960s, three key aspectsof destination management with relevanceto the theme of cultural developmentcontributed to the later decline of theseaside resort in Britain:

— lack of re-investment of the profits ofgrowth;

— decline in facilities and infrastructure;— standards not improving or keeping

pace with broader leisure standards,including those overseas.91

Low investment and poor planning inseaside resorts continued through the 1970sand 1980s. Morgan and Pritchard cite theexamples of the small resort of Mumbles,near Swansea, which closed down theworld’s first passenger railway, losing apotential tourist attraction, and of otherresorts which closed their own leisurefacilities and built on these sites withoutplanning for their replacement or futuremarket needs.92 The seaside industryresponded to the crises of the 1980s byturning to ‘new’ forms of tourism such asactivity holidays, conferences, languageschools and the overseas market, but waslimited by the shortage of qualityaccommodation, size of hotel stock andability to provide competitive conferencefacilities.One sees, then, a process of significant

and sustained investment in culture inseaside towns from the 19th centurythrough the First World War, when mostresorts were fortified and their tourismfunction was negligible. Investment then

increased dramatically until the SecondWorld War when, again, seaside townsbecame part of the ‘frontline’. Ten years onfrom the Second World War, investmentin cultural development began to slideduring a period of rising profits andtourism growth. This pattern continuedthrough the 1960s and early 1970s, whenexternal economic shocks began to have animpact on the seaside tourism market inBritain, and a period of recession andeconomic restructuring followed, asdescribed above. The lack of investment inculture and leisure facilities in the precedingperiod left seaside destinations poorlyplaced to compete with new urban andoverseas competitors, and a negativefeedback process then gathered pace, asperceptions of poor quality led to a fall inconsumer demand, which in turn reducedcapital investment, deepening problems ofquality and capacity. From the 1960s to thelate 1990s, there was a hiatus in traditionalpatterns of cultural investment in seasidetowns, but the contemporary approach ofcultural regeneration, while appearingnovel, began again the concept of culturaland leisure investment as a driver fortourism and urban development in thesedestinations.Taking into account this tradition of

cultural development in seaside towns, onemight expect that examining the impacts ofcultural regeneration in this context wouldprovide a new perspective on the impactsof cultural regeneration. Specifically, thenegative impacts discussed above, whichidentify a dissonance between ‘new’ and‘old’ uses of space and the exclusivity ofcultural development, can be challengedfrom within the context of seaside culturalregeneration, where contemporarydevelopments build on a tradition of localentrepreneurship and a tourism sectorstructured around small, medium andmicro-enterprises. In order to explore thisfurther, a case study of Margate in Kent ispresented showing how public opinion on


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and engagement with a high-profile seasidecultural regeneration scheme has developed.

CULTURAL REGENERATION INMARGATEMargate in Kent is certainly one of the firstthree, and possibly the first, of England’sseaside resorts.93 It was first served bycoaches and then steamers which came upthe river Thames from London to thisdestination on the North Kent coast. Later,the opening of the Margate Sands railwaystation made this one of the most popularseaside resorts of the 19th and 20thcenturies. In 1830, Margate was receivingmore than 100,000 visitors a year by seaand, by the 1960s, annual visitor numbershad risen to 32 million.94

The period of growth in Margate sawhigh levels of investment in culturalprojects in the town, especially at the start

of the 20th century, when a large ‘wintergardens’ was built to host year-roundconcerts, along with two large cinemas anda scenic railway. Leisure facilities also grewin this period, with the addition of lidos,bathing pools and pavilions.95 At its height,Margate was a cultural jewel of the south-east of England, catering to both middle-class and working-class visitors andinnovating in the provision of cultural andleisure attractions.The decline of the seaside tourism

market from the 1970s was felt particularlykeenly in Margate, where the economy wasoverwhelmingly dependent on tourismincome, and its geographical separationfrom other urban or industrial centres left itwith few opportunities to pursue tomaintain its economic sustainability. Thelegacy of this period of decline has beenhigh unemployment, a declining

Figure 1: Margate seafront



population with an ageing demographic,benefit dependence and numerousredundant sites and buildings (Figures 1 and2). By the 1990s, the economy had failed todiversify and was still heavily dependent ona shrinking tourism market. Incontemporary popular culture, Margatehad become a byword for the faded seasidetown, featured in films and TV to evokethe feeling of decline and decay. Thanet,the local government district of whichMargate is the most significant area, is the60th most deprived of 354 localgovernment areas in England, and Margateitself contains some of the most deprivedcouncil wards in the south-east.96

In the late 1990s, local government andfunding agencies took the decision to seeknew forms of economic activity tostimulate the visitor economy and revivethe town. This decision led to the

development of local regeneration plans,including the promotion of a culturalquarter in the ‘old’ town area of Margate,and also incorporated the vision for a majornew international art museum to be builton the seafront. From this point it becameclear that a strategy of cultural regenerationwas being followed in Margate, with thestimulation of cultural tourism its primaryaim. It was hoped that the economicimpacts of this form of tourism, throughdirect benefits and secondary spending inthe local economy, would drive theregeneration of the town. In 2003, aninternational competition chose thearchitects who would design the newmuseum. Initially, this was costed at £7m,which had risen to £25m by 2005, withpredictions of a possible 100 per centoverrun in costs. At this stage, faced withsignificant public opposition and continued

Figure 2: Margate shopping arcade


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concerns over costs and design issues,regional government withdrew its fundingfrom the scheme, and it was put on hold.The early rhetoric employed to justify

this cultural regeneration scheme madefrequent references to Tate Modern inLondon and the Guggenheim Museum inBilbao as high-profile examples of theimpact of cultural flagship developments ina regeneration context, showing theinfluence of city-paradigms in culturalregeneration, even in smaller urban areas.The transplantation of this model ofregeneration produced critical reactions, asexpected from the cultural regenerationliterature cited above. The newdevelopments faced a hostile reaction fromlocal media outlets, as well as numerouscommunity and residents groups. Theseconcerns were expressed in terms of theexclusivity of the cultural regenerationconcept, dissatisfaction with the design, thelack of community involvement in thedecision-making process and the costs ofthe project.97

In 2006, the Margate RenewalPartnership was constituted as a body tooversee the town’s regeneration,98 and moreholistic plans for the town’s regenerationwere developed. The role of the TurnerContemporary project was re-examined anda new museum planned, in a processinvolving extensive consultation. In additionto this, extensive audience developmentwork continues to take place around thenew development. The TurnerContemporary project itself is located in aredundant shopping space in the towncentre and receives high numbers of visitorsfrom the local community. The old townarea will be the cultural quarter, withsupport given to local cultural producersand businesses to help them to takeadvantage of the opportunities that thisbrings. Importantly, key local heritage sitessuch as the former amusement park, whichwas once a landmark feature of the townand a significant employer, have been

integrated into the future development plansfor the town.99 Originally, the site of theformer ‘Dreamland’ theme park was thesource of serious conflict between plannersand residents. This attraction occupied aposition of symbolic importance in thecollective consciousness of the town, havingbeen a feature of the seafront for twogenerations (Figure 3). A pressure group, the‘Save Dreamland Campaign’ was set up in2003 to campaign for, first, the preservationof the site for use as a visitor attraction in theface of significant developer pressures torealise the value of the land and, second, toplace the site at the centre of theregeneration plans of the town. Over anumber of years, this pressure groupcampaigned actively, building up localsupport and generating media attention fortheir cause. Eventually, the new plans forthe town brought the Dreamland site intotheir ambit, and the pressure group becameinstitutionalised as the Dreamland Trust.This charitable trust is now an importantthird-sector stakeholder in localregeneration planning and was instrumentalin the central government award of £3.7mfor the redevelopment of the theme park siteas a heritage attraction celebrating seasideculture, which has made a £12.4mdevelopment project viable on the site. Thisis an instance of a concern highlighted byMiles100 in an analysis of culturalregeneration and social exclusion in formerindustrial cities, that cultural regenerationstrategies often make use of sites of formerlocal symbolic and economic importance,which can make their re-use problematic,but also o!ers an example of how thesedi#culties can be overcome throughpartnership.New plans to refurbish the cultural

attractions of the previous era demonstratethe way in which contemporaryregeneration is building on a tradition oflocal cultural tourism development. Thehigh-profile nature of this culturalregeneration project has begun to draw



cultural tourists to the town, and thebenefits of secondary spending have helpedto engage local businesses in theaccommodation and catering sectors in the

redevelopments. This approach toregeneration, which is building on localcultural heritage and the still-existingtourism industry, rather than focusing on

Figure 3: Dreamland Tower


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the needs of high-spending visitors, has ledto a more favourable climate of publicopinion and an increase in publicengagement with the cultural aspects ofregeneration and the processes ofconsultation, and to a more supportivelocal media reaction. Although the finalimpacts of this scheme remain to be seen,one can see in the case of Margate howrecognising the specific local, historicalsynergies of cultural development,economic growth and tourism can lead to amore inclusive form of culturalregeneration in contrast to the impositionof top-down regeneration schemes with thenegative local impacts described in theregeneration literature.

INCLUSIVE SEASIDEREGENERATION?Both recent regeneration policy rhetoricand research agree that regenerationoutcomes are improved with theparticipation and engagement ofcommunities.101,102 This can hamper theprogress of cultural regeneration, wherethe focus is often on high-profile flagshipdevelopments or cultural mega events suchas the Olympic Games. In cases such asthese, the research literature points outserious deficits in community engagementand social outcomes. Previous researchinto cultural regeneration in anotherKentish seaside town has indicated that,owing to the lack of an explicit strategyof community engagement, thedevelopment appeared to be generatingnegative social impacts in the localcommunity.103 Rhetoric that foregroundsthe success of city-based culturalregeneration schemes may not be helpfulin planning for the future of seasideregeneration, but it is also clear that thecontemporary prevalence of culturalregeneration on Britain’s coastline will begenerating new models of this type ofregeneration strategy that will o!er freshideas and methods to policy makers and

regeneration practitioners working acrossthe full range of urban typologies.The example of Margate shows how, by

making use of their unique culturalheritage, seaside towns may be able to planfor the positive economic impacts ofcultural regeneration and limit the negativesocial impacts that a reliance on culture canbring to a regeneration scheme. Thespecific case of cultural regeneration inseaside towns provides a perspective fromwhich to critique the more commonpractices of this method in cities, andsuggests that cultural regeneration whichbuilds on local cultural heritage, even ifthat involves recognising and incorporatingaspects of decline, may help policy makersand practitioners to avoid potential pitfallsand help to deliver successful outcomes. Inparticular, Margate demonstrates that theformer industrial sites of the tourismindustry play a significant role in thelikelihood of public approval forregeneration plans and that, as in theformer ‘heavy’ industrial cities of northernEngland, their sympathetic inclusion indevelopments can promote successfulregeneration outcomes.For seaside towns, this suggests that,

where other strategies of seasideregeneration have not failed to reducesocial exclusion or lead to lastingimprovements in tourism, culturalregeneration can o!er a good way forward.Sustained longitudinal research will beneeded into the impacts of this approach,however, as it is too soon to judge theseschemes on anything other than perceptionsand early indicators, as important as theseare.This model of development may point

the way to a more inclusive model ofcultural regeneration that can be seen as arenaissance of cultural heritage and localentrepreneurship, in opposition to the top-down cultural regeneration schemes inthese areas, which can exclude locals at theexpense of high-value cultural tourists.



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EH, Swindon.94. Elsea, K. (2005), ‘Developing Turner Contemporary’,

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