Morecambe gets wise

At the mention of tourism in Morecambe, the taxi driver sniffs: "Since the council combined with Lancaster two-and-a-half years ago, all the money's gone there, because of the students. Morecambe's dying."

Like most British seaside towns, the historical picture of tourism in Morecambe is one of genteel decline. A thriving resort since the Victorian era, Morecambe's popularity waned from the 1960s onwards, when the prospect of guaranteed sun and cheap package deals lured holiday-makers abroad. City councillor and chair of the tourism subcommittee June Ashworth says: "We have lost the family market. People can jet off to Spain and have a less expensive holiday - although Morecambe caters for the cheaper end of the market."

Morecambe has an ageing population, which also has an impact on local businesses. The latest figures (from the 1991 census) put Morecambe and Heysham's population at 45,109 - 46.6% aged over 45 and 12% over 75. Geoffrey Fisher, owner of the 70-seat Whitewalls restaurant, says: "I've had two very loyal, regular customers dying recently. We had the funerals here as well; but in the long run that's over £70 a week in takings gone. Who's going to replace them?" Good question. The Fishers would like to retire, and the restaurant has been on the market for more than a year.

The dwindling revenue from tourism has also had its impact on the residents of Morecambe. Figures from the 1991 census show that 47.3% of the population was economically inactive and two Morecambe wards were among the most deprived 10% in the country. For this reason, in 1991, Lancaster City Council was awarded a single regeneration budget (SRB) of £4.6m - money given by the Government to help deprived areas. Part of the money was used between 1995 and 1996 to redesign the promenade area. A further £2.2m - a combination of Lottery arts funds and SRB money - was invested in the Tern Public Art Project: a series of bird sculptures and pavement games along the extended stone jetty that celebrate Morecambe Bay's position as a breeding ground for thousands of sea birds making long migratory flights to Africa or the Arctic.

But none of these improvements had the same impact as the Queen unveiling the statue of a comedian in 1999. In characteristic one-legged pose, the bronze figure of Eric Morecambe on the seafront is surrounded by flowers and by flashing violet lights at night. "It made worldwide news and put Morecambe on the map again," says Ashworth. "We wouldn't have thought that a statue could appeal to the nation's imagination. It's been a means of marketing the town in a way that we wouldn't have thought possible."

In 2000, 268,815 people visited or contacted the town's tourist information centre, compared with 130,017 in 1998 and only 73,529 in 1994 before regeneration work began. This background of regeneration has encouraged a wave of private investment of the kind that Morecambe has not seen for more than 10 years. Private firms are not investing in funfairs or water parks, but - encouraged by cheap property prices and a rise in visitor numbers - in hotels.

Surrey-based Top Respect bought the 32-bedroom Park hotel and the 28-bedroom Grosvenor in May at auction. Kalber Leisure is carrying out a £4m restoration of the 40-bedroom Midland hotel and intends to re-create its 1930s opulence and grandeur.

The 29-bedroom Clarendon hotel, owned by the brewers Mitchell's of Lancaster, reopened in April after a £400,000 makeover. General manager Carol Stedman says it has been running at 80% occupancy and is booked until the end of September. She believes the added conference rooms will provide more corporate business.

Another encouraging sign is the conversion by Morrison's, the supermarket chain, of the Frontierland adventure park, formerly owned by Blackpool Pleasure Beach, into a retail park.

The general feeling is that Morecambe has turned a corner. Head of tourism services Ron Sands believes recent investments will have a knock-on effect and attract more leisure and holiday companies.

During the first weeks of the foot-and-mouth outbreak there was an increase in the number of day-trippers. People were visiting seaside towns because the countryside was closed. "One of the attractions for walkers is the five miles of level promenade, which is still exhilarating in the way that the countryside can be," says Sands.

For the larger hotels that can accommodate coach tours, Morecambe is used as a base from which to visit the Lake District, the Yorkshire Dales and Blackpool. Coaching tour operators, such as Airedale Tours, Paul James Coaches and Carefree Holidays, organise short breaks, predominantly for the over-55s, who do not enjoy countryside walks.

The 51-bedroom Auckland hotel, which is large enough to take coach parties, has remained buoyant throughout the crisis, running at an average occupancy of 80% up to 8 December. Co-owner of the family-run business, Lisa Wood, says: "Our main market sector is over-55-year-olds [on coach tours]. There has been a slump in independent visitors using Morecambe as a resort."

Predictably, it is the establishments too small to take block coach bookings that are struggling. Jim Catterall, chairman of the Morecambe Hotel and Tourism Association, which represents 45 small hotels and guesthouses, says his members have suffered from the "double whammy" of foot-and-mouth and the decline in family entertainment. The Bubbles seafront water park has remained closed two summers running. Catterall has wanted to put up his prices from £15 per person per night for bed and breakfast, but says: "We haven't been able to. People won't pay more." He says his 11-bedroom Trevelyan hotel lost £600 because of foot-and-mouth, and he had virtually no bookings for the summer. There has been little incentive for ramblers to use Morecambe as a base when the footpaths of surrounding areas are closed. "People want to be able to get out of the car and walk up a hill, and they can't," says Catterall. However, he emphasises that the situation is far worse for neighbouring rural businesses.

Statistics from the Countryside Agency released on 16 July showed that 54% of rights of way were closed in the North-west, while 83% were closed in the Lake District and 99% in the Yorkshire Dales. On 17 July there were 50 foot-and-mouth cases in Lancashire, and neighbouring Cumbria was by far the worst-hit area in the country, with 793 cases.

It must have been frustrating, therefore, that Catterall received 450 calls for rooms for 6,7 and 8 July when he has only 24 bedspaces.

The Holidays in the Sun "25th anniversary of punk" music festival attracted more than 3,000 punks from all over the world who spent an estimated £750,000 in the resort. The punks have been coming for the past seven years, and they are an example of the niche markets that Ashworth sees as the way forward for the economic prosperity of Morecambe.

Ornithologists form another niche market that has been cultivated. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, in partnership with the council, opened an office on the seafront last October from which free educational activities for children and bird-watching tours start.

Ashworth says: "We have to look at marketing Morecambe in different ways. It would need an awful lot of new continuing attractions to sustain the family market, which the council alone cannot afford to provide. People have the perception that the council should do this, the council should do that, but if they look back to when the resort was really thriving, all the investment was private."

Despite a tiny tourism budget of £300,000 out of Lancaster City Council's total annual budget of £15m, Morecambe's tourist board has created a positive climate. The "Eric" statue provides the town with a quirky and unique emblem that is modern as well as linked to the past. Those promoting tourism hope that the new wave of private investment and the successful promotion of a range of niche markets will attract new generations of visitors.

Morecambe

(Figures for Lancaster district, which includes Morecambe, Lancaster and the Lune Valley)

Population of Morecambe and Heysham: 45,109
Short breaks: average length of stay is four to five days; average spend by each overnight visitor was £43.05 in 1999, up from £37.91 in 1998
Annual visitors: 2.5 million (1.5 million bednights)
Tourism: supports about 200,000 jobs in the North-west. The tourism budget for Morecambe is about £300,000 out of a total Lancaster City Council annual budget of £15m
Places to stay: 4,000 bedspaces at 46 hotels, 1 motel, 39 B&Bs, 93 guesthouses, 14 inns, 10 farms and three country house hotels; plus 12,000 bedspaces in the non-serviced sector (flats, self-catering units and caravans)
Visitor expenditure: 1998 £43,764,645; 1999 £65,553,765 (a 49.8% increase)
Overnight stays: 1998 1,154,346; 1999 1,522,714 (a 31.9% increase)
Average hotel room occupancy: 2000 52%; 1999 48%; 1998 47.8%

Next week we visit the Scottish Borders