Attractions Management Issue 1 2011 - TourismInsights

On 27th July 2008, I left the pier at about
6pm and went straight to the airport to go
on holiday. At 7am the next morning, my
sister (who’s my business partner) rang
and told me that the pier was on fire.
I put the tv on and Sky News was showing
the fire, which very quickly escalated. I
got in the car and went straight to the airport.
I was numb all the way home.
When I got to the pier, there were thousands
of people around, but it was almost
silent. It was as if I was outside looking in
at someone else’s nightmare. It just didn’t
seem as though it could be real.
People arrived on the scene at about seven
o’clock in the morning. Within an hour and
a half there was nothing left – it had completely
burnt itself out.
We cordoned off the underside so people
couldn’t get under there because stuff was
still falling through. As soon as we’d done
this and knew the site was safe, which took
three days, we opened again. There wasn’t
much left, but what we had we opened. We
then set about planning the rebuild.
The pavilion was burned to the ground. The
sub structure – the steel underneath – was,
remarkably, still in tact. The secondary
steels, the ones that sit on top of the piles
were damaged and had to be replaced, but
the piles themselves, the bit that was 105
years old was relatively untouched. Above
the deck there was about 500 tonnes of
twisted steel. Other than that, everything
we had was gone.
No idea. The investigation that was carried
out concluded that it wasn’t a kitchen fire
or arson. The offi cial verdict was that it was
probably an electrical fault although they
were not able to offer any evidence for that.
We set a design competition among a
number of architectural practices and
chose a design by Angus Meek Architects
of Bristol, UK (see P54).
We requested planning permission in
December 2008 and received it in March
2009. By this time we’d cleared the site
and had started the enabling works to
the sub structure. Although most of it
was undamaged by the fi re, the modern
building was much heavier than the new
building, so it needed substantial work.
We then went out to tender for the main
contract works for the new building. That
contract was awarded in August 2009 with
a completion date of June 2010, which
unfortunately wasn’t achieved. We actually
opened in October 2010.
The original pier had four rides and about
300 slot machines. When my sister and I
bought the pier in 2008, we spent £1.5m
(1.77m, US$2.36m) improving the catering,
adding three retail outlets, a Go Kart
track and a climbing wall.
The new pavilion has 14 major indoor
rides. These range from family activities,
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AM 1 2011 ©cybertrek 2011