Chen CHIA-LIN , Department of Geography and Planning, University of Liverpool, United Kingdom
Sykes OLIVIER, Department of Geography and Planning, University of Liverpool, United Kingdom
This paper contextualises the revitalisation pathways of seaside resort towns in Britain under two major forces, namely long-term economic structural changes and the persistent geographical inequalities experienced in these seaside towns. These places grew rapidly from the late nineteenth century as places of escape, pleasure, spectacle and unusual experiences in contrast to the working class everyday life. From the mid-1970s, a massive decline hit British seaside resort towns due to a wide range of economic and cultural shifts. Yet, the impacts of these changes appeared strongest in the most popular working-class leisure destinations, resulting in structurally uneven development among British seaside resort towns, notably Blackpool, Margate, Great Yarmouth and so on. In 2020, many of these places were classified as left-behind places in Britain largely based on their socio-economic performance and conditions. However, such a fixed and tagging approach does not take into account the revitalisation efforts made in these places. Many of these places are demonstrating different pathways in reaction to new challenges through varied capacities related to the social, economic, infrastructure and governance dimensions. This paper attempts to go beyond classifying these suffering seaside resort places as left-behind places. A tentative analytical framework is developed to categorise four types of pathways, namely resistance, recovery, adaptation and diversification and associated criteria/qualities. A comparative scoping analysis will be conducted to first identify what are these working-class destinations, investigate which towns could be classified in what stages of pathways during the transition process, and reflect on policy implications for addressing the persistent regional inequality encountered by these left-behind seaside resort towns in Britain.
Mots clés : Coastal Seaside Resort|Left-Behind|Revitalisation|Pathways
A105591CC