A rebuild minus all the heritage

Rival director opposes application to restore West Pier

The Argus Saturday, 24 January, 2004

THE battle to restore Brighton's ramshackle West Pier is one of the most contentious issues in the city. Brighton West Pier Trust and developers St Modwen are desperate to see the burnt-out shell restored. But their plans have consistently been opposed by the Noble Organisation, which owns the rival Palace Pier, or Brighton Pier as Noble refer to it. Today, one of the group's directors, DAVID BIESTERFIELD, explains why he is against the project.

LATER this month the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) will decide on St Modwen's latest application for state aid to save the West Pier - except the West Pier will not be saved.

A replica pier is to be built, English Heritage having now confirmed it is to be a reconstruction not a restoration or repair.

It is now clear the 112,000sqft of new space to be created will not be a heritage attraction.

St Modwen's consultants say both the pier and the new buildings on the foreshore will comprise licensed and general leisure uses.

Whatever general leisure means, the tone is set by the list of operators St Modwen says will fill the space - Pizza Hut, JD Wetherspoons, Bar Med, Nandos and Jumpin Jaks.

So Brighton seafront, the surrounding conservation areas and the West Pier itself are to be dominated by the type of businesses found on every town centre leisure circuit.

They are reputable businesses but hardly redolent of the much trumpeted heritage attraction.

Given that a number are already represented in Brighton they are unlikely to attract any new visitors to the city, as, in fairness, the West Pier Trust has always accepted.

In the run up to its decision I hope the HLF's trustees will properly examine all the views that have been put to them.

As we predicted a year ago, it turns out the figures relied on by St Modwen were wrong. The cost of the project is now said to have risen by more than £6 million. The public purse is being asked to bear all of this increase.

Having restored Brighton Pier at a cost of millions of pounds and without any state aid, so that it is now a substantial generator of visits to Brighton, my company is greatly concerned at this latest turn of events.

Neither are we alone in our opposition.

Every major conservation group in Brighton opposes the current plans as do residents and other well-informed people with non-commercial interests, under the Save Our Seafront banner.

We are not against attempts to rebuild the pier. Indeed, we have supported previous ideas.

Some time ago we put forward a formula that would enable the pier to be rebuilt but without most of the damaging enabling development.

The West Pier Trust, despite the fact engineers have advised the pier structure is stable and there is no great urgency, has refused to discuss this and suggest no alternatives can even be considered until the St Modwen scheme has failed.

It seems to me the consideration of alternatives should come first. In addition, both Save Our Seafront and the Chris Eubank Consortium are known to have viable schemes, which the West Pier Trust has also refused to consider.

As many local people have recognised there is a difference between recapturing the authentic appeal of the West Pier and simply ploughing on with an ill-thought out proposal.

The West Pier Trust is wedded to a scheme which, in addition to its architectural shortcomings, will, if it is to succeed, require the deflection of some £25 million of revenues from existing licensed, leisure and retail businesses in Brighton and Hove.

Brighton Pier, whose market is exactly that at which the West Pier will be aimed, will bear the brunt of this deflection and that will have a potentially devastating effect on our ability to maintain investment in Brighton's other listed pier.

But we will not be the only business to lose trade. The spending power of Brighton's visitors is finite - an obvious but crucially important point.

The size of the required West Pier revenues has not previously been publicised, so it is no surprise that many small traders will not have appreciated the likely impact.

Readers may not know the amount of public money asked for in this single grant, £20 million, is more than that allocated to Northern Ireland, Wales, or a number of English regions.

Against this background, my company's concerns -and those of others opposing this scheme - at least deserve a fair hearing.

We are proud of our involvement with Brighton and, like those who live and work here, we want the city's economy and community to flourish.

But we firmly believe a replica pier offering yet more bars and restaurants, bringing with it enabling development that will damage the seafront and conservation areas, is not in the city's best interest.

That concern is enforced by the way in which the subsidised bars, restaurants and general leisure uses will inevitably undermine other local businesses.

That is why we are urging the HLF to think again about the current plans.

All we ask is for the West Pier Trust and Brighton and Hove City Council to look, with open minds, at other options before it is too late.