Pier today, gone tomorrow: Blackpool pleasure pier up for sale

Piers (the structures, not the people) are back in the news this week, with the announcement that Blackpool North, the oldest of the Lancashire town’s three pleasure piers, is for sale. Dating to 1863, it is, since the demise of Brighton West in East Sussex, the oldest surviving and best-preserved pier designed by the Victorian engineer Eugenius Birch, with a spidery cast and wrought-iron substructure and attractive minaret-roofed kiosks.

The owners said they intend to focus on their wider portfolio of local properties, including the Blackpool Central and South Piers. Both date back to the 19th century, but have undergone much modernisation and are not listed. ‘Given the competitive nature of today’s leisure market, I wonder if a suitable buyer will be found?’ asks Tim Mickleburgh, honorary vice-president of the National Piers Society. ‘The North Pier has already lost its railway and I would hate the whole pier to be altered so that it bears little resemblance to Birch’s original masterpiece.’

Blackpool North’s Art Deco theatre, one of few remaining operational pier theatres, is on the Theatres Trust’s At Risk Register. Tim considers that ‘it would make sense’ to upgrade its listing from Grade II to II*, a status enjoyed by other historic piers such as Saltburn in North Yorkshire and Eastbourne in East Sussex.

But that's not all. Garth Pier in Bangor, a former winner of the (deep breath) National Piers Society’s Pier of the Year competition, is in need of £40,000 for repairs. A group of locals, Friends of Garth Pier (FGP), has set up a campaign asking for donations.

Garth Pier in Bangor was built in 1896 and extends to some 450 metres, making it the second-longest pier in Wales. It boasts views over the Menai Strait, Anglesey, Llandudno and Eryri (Snowdonia). When it was announced that Garth Pier won Pier of the Year back in 2022, judges commented that it ‘boasts the pest panorama of views of any pier in the UK’.

However, like many other piers, it is trying its best to fall down. Garth was bought by Bangor council for the princely sum of 1p in 1975, and a £1 million restoration was completed in 2022. The council has spent £2.2 million on the substructure, which holds the pier up, and the Friends of Garth Pier group says the £40,000 is the last piece of the puzzle, with donations matched by the council.

‘The climate is changing, the environment isn't favourable to a structure like this so the plan is that we strengthen the structure underneath the platform,’ Medwyn Hughes, mayor of Bangor, told the BBC on a stormy day last week. ‘A day like today is about showing that we need the money to do that. We've completed three quarters of the work, this is the last quarter to make it safe for the next 25 years.’