Major Developers Sought for Heart of Great Yarmouth Seafront
28 June 2006Great Yarmouth Borough Council is expecting a rush of developers to express their interest in a 30 acre seafront development site situated at the heart of the famous Golden Mile. The Council is looking forward to receiving a barrage of different ideas on how best to develop this prime location.
With 5.5 million visitors to Great Yarmouth each year, the site provides a fantastic development opportunity. The town is already witnessing a dramatic overhaul with many exciting projects underway and more in the pipeline, including a multi-million pound scheme to build an outer harbour which should see the town attracting additional trade and even foot passengers from Holland by 2009.
The Council believes this makes this unique seafront attraction development opportunity especially interesting, as investors will realise the potential Great Yarmouth has to increase the number of visitors and to further extend the tourist season. The overall aim is to extend the tourist season and a key part of this is to develop the famous Golden Mile to meet tourism needs in the 21
st century.
Mark Barrow, Corporate Director for Great Yarmouth Borough Council, said, “We would like to work in partnership with potential developers and we are open to a variety of different proposals. However, we will of course carefully consider all proposals in light of the town’s current offerings to minimise any potential impact to existing businesses and to the local population.”
Bert Collins, Cabinet Member Tourism, Enterprise & Culture, said, “There is now a real buzz of excitement here as residents and businesses can see the future potential. We are looking forward to working with developers and investors to develop this prime seafront site, which will further accelerate the regeneration process, creating jobs and attracting more visitors as a result.”
The Council is committed to the regeneration of Great Yarmouth and a capital investment programme to improve the town centre, heritage quarter and seafront is currently underway. This includes lighting improvements, street furniture and landscaping, road infrastructure improvements, property enhancements, information improvements and routes and signage enhancements.
The work already completed has been carried out after in-depth consultations with residents, visitors and businesses and is transforming the look and feel of the main areas of the town.
For further information, interested parties should contact Great Yarmouth Borough Council on 01493 846143, email
thefuture@goldenmile.org.uk or visit the website
www.goldenmile.org.uk. The deadline for submitting outline proposals and commercial background is Monday 18
th September 2006.
For media enquiries or further comment, please contact Patrick Peal or Kirstie Richardson, Band & Brown Communications. Tel: 01603 417722 or email
kirstie.richardson@bbpr.comNotes to editors:
Great Yarmouth began attracting visitors following the publication of Dr Russell’s book “Seawater – The Universal Cure” in the 1750’s. However, it was the introduction of the railways in the 1840’s/50’s that really propelled Great Yarmouth into the realms of mass tourism. Many buildings and hotels on the seafront are the result of this early investment in tourism.
The infrastructure for the current seafront was largely constructed between 1900 and 1940.
Tourism in Great Yarmouth today accounts for around 1.33 million staying visitors plus 3.7 million day visitors, generating a direct and indirect spend of £420 million per annum. This represents around one third of the area’s wealth and also one third of the jobs.
Visitor numbers peaked in the 1970’s at over 9 million tourist nights. In recent years the figure is fairly static at around 5 million. There is a loyal, core market but in order to increase the number of visitors, the ‘offer’ must be upgraded to compete with a changing market.
Great Yarmouth attracts a high proportion of day visitors (74%) than staying visitors (26%) although staying visitors account for 69% of tourism spend. 82% of overnight visitors stayed in self-catering accommodation and currently only 8% of visitors are from overseas.
Great Yarmouth is an incredibly robust resort with the potential to maximise opportunities to build new markets with real volume and increased value for the future – which the Tourism Strategy aims to address.