Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
Well I expect this is hardly a surprise...as.. other than chaining visitors to the seafront railings we cannot make this work at all. We just cannot seem to get anyone to come and stay. Even the cruise liner visitors who one would imagine would be a captive audience, leg it inland post haste as soon as they disembark. You only have to look at the massed coaches all lined up ready to cart them off to Canterbury, London, anywhere else.
There is no point in us telling ourselves yet again that we have great things here to interest the tourist...we have the..ermmm..the...ermm..well there's the Roman Painted House when its open but hardly a show stopper. I havent even been to that myself and I live here. Then there's Market Sq where nothing is open after 6pm.
Rather than continue to inflict this pain on myself I will list the winners...
1Blackpool, Lancs
2Brighton, Sussex
3Whitby, North Yorks
4Bournemouth, Dorset
5Scarborough, North Yorks
6Newquay, Cornwall
7Torquay, Devon
8St Ives, Cornwall
9Skegness, Lincs
10Great Yarmouth, Norfolk
What we are seeing here is a continued love for the obvious places. The places with lots of gloss and high levels of activity as provided by rides and rollercoasters and funfairs, candy floss and donkey rides etc etc. So there you have it.
Personally I havent been to Blackpool but I certainly frollicked away a few fun filled hours in Brighton in my time. Brighton has all the usual paraphernalia..a magic pier, everything for the kids you could imagine, fun palaces, rides, seafront fish n chips, shopping for the girls, and most importantly of all, it doesnt close down at 6pm.
Sue Nicholas- Location: river
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 6,023
St Ives Paul .Hardly Blackpool.Just glorious beaches ,art and fantastic pasties
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
paul
we are a port not a resort, we do not have pleasure beaches or theme parks like resorts do.
i doubt that people think of us when they fancy a day at the seaside.
pity really we have a better promenade and beaches than most, but there is nowhere that parents can but a bucket and spade, candy floss or a stick of rock along the seafront.
difficult sometimes to get a cup of tea or coffee.
then, as you say, what happens after 6 pm?
Guest 693- Registered: 12 Nov 2009
- Posts: 1,266
My wife's family are from Blackpool. Do not be fooled by visitor statistics, in the depths of winter you won't see a soul there, only the foolhardy and the seagulls go out when the wind's blowing off the Oirish Sea - and me. I love it out of season, you have Rossall beach all to yourself and you can walk miles without ever seeing another soul. Every time we go there the dog think's he's died and gone to heaven and so do I; after a bracing walk nothing better than a mug of tea and a steak pudding 'n' chips with lashings of gravy on from the Bispham Kitchen, simply to die for.
In the summer months, it's heaving with coachloads of tourists, mainly from Manchester and Glasgow, and the prices double, the car parks are full and the amusement arcades fill up with pickpockets and tarts. If it's #1 on the tourism list, I'm not surprised, but - really - would you want your town full of chavs, gyppos and cheap B&Bs that act as rent-by-the-hour knocking shops, because that's the reality? It may surprise you, but Blackpool has more than its own share of empty shops, shabby shopping centres filled with pound shops and boarded up pubs.
Give me Dover any day in the summer over Blackpool; the grass is not always greener on the other side. And, Howard is quite right - Dover is not a seaside resort; long may it stay that way.
True friends stab you in the front.
Guest 690- Registered: 10 Oct 2009
- Posts: 4,150
I`ll second Andy`s comment`s. Sometimes three or four visits a year to Blackpool, but in Winter, it was always so strange trying to visualise the Summer crowds. Anyway, we may have been in 11th place and beat all the other`s in Kent. Ten is an an awfully small amount, and I would never dream of Dover being in the top twenty, never mind ten!
Tell them that I came, and no one answered.
Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
Ah yes indeed lads one glance out of the window confirms to me that we are not a resort. Its high summer and the seafront is totally empty...nothing throbbing thriving or thrilling happening here alas. Although not a resort we do long to be at least a destination. Because being a destination with added tourists spending lots of money would bring jobs aplenty.
We do of course have our hot moments such as the Rolls Royce weekend..then in an instant they all go..and we are left again with the ghostly tumbleweeds rolling along the prom prom prom......Yet once upon a time, as I see in Scotchie's book, it used to thrive.
Sigh...
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
don't forget paul that our friend mr goldfinger at the harbour board does not allow anything on the promenade that will attract visitors.
just the odd special events but no permanent outlets.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
[URL]
[/URL]
How it used to be...
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
that must have been done with bobs approval when he was starting out.
Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
Wow! Marek what a picture..well done with that me oul mucker, says it all really.
lol!
Howard...I didnt know BG was that old, although on reflection.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
There is no need to act snobbish about attracting the masses to Dover perhaps a bit of good old fashioned fun would do us all and the town well. Everyone knows what Blackpool is about so don't go if you don't like that sort of entertainment.I loved it as a kid and so did my daughter when we went for a visit.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 690- Registered: 10 Oct 2009
- Posts: 4,150
Ah Marek, what about a steam traction engine weekend down the front then?
Tell them that I came, and no one answered.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
Colin
Great idea..there's a massive Steam Engine Rally every year in Sellindge on the old A20 that attracts thousands over a BH weekend.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 690- Registered: 10 Oct 2009
- Posts: 4,150
That`s right mate, but just thinking possibly something similar here?
Tell them that I came, and no one answered.
It will be interesting locally to see if the opening of the Turner Contemporary at Margate manages to turn Margate into a sea side destination again.
Certainly the fact that there is a branch of the Tate at St Ives has made a difference to visitor numbers hence its inclusion in the top ten list.
The Turner Contemporary in Margate has cost £17.5 million ( of which £6.4 million was from KCC) and one wonders whether its opening next year will further open up the North Kent coast to the Islington-on-Sea crowd who have already transformed Whitstable for the better.
Guest 653- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,540
We'll never be a destination if we don't try.
All these Towns/Cities market themselves to the Group Travel market - we don't.
Group Travel is what we should be doing - working with the coach companies to make Dover a destination. We have more historic sites and attractions than any other coastal Town, from at least Southend to Southampton.
Again, I know what should be done and who to do it with and have said so a number of times in the past, but no one wants to take it up - and it wouldn't cost the earth.
People who can make the decisions to turn Dover into a destination, simply don't want to know.
This is connected to my posting on another thread about working for Dover from the ground-floor; there is no one seriously working on it.
But it's not now my job, so back to the gardening and painting.
Roger
Guest 673- Registered: 16 Jun 2008
- Posts: 1,388
Re Margate, have just noticed in the KM "What's On" magazine that the big Margate air show is on today and tomorrow.
http://www.thanet.gov.uk/news/focus_articles/margate_big_event.aspxhoward mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
i seriously believe that the turner gallery will kick start the regeneration of margate.
i believe that there are serious attempts to restore dreamland too.
Hopefully rthey will put all the Emin rubbish in the Margate Art Gallery, tow it out to sea and blow it up.
Guest 649- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 14,118
We see Margate now geting some funds put into it and they will be in about 3 years time back at the top of places to go in Kent ,but again Dover will still be the same in ten years time unless in May you vote in a new DDC and get rid of that planning dept.
