UK seaside town 'overrun with scroungers' has huge new plan to win over tourists
The bold vision for the former fishing capital includes making the most of its waters to attract visitors.
A struggling UK seaside town is hoping to bring back tourists - by “reminding people” it’s by the water.
Grimsby - like many other towns across the UK - has suffered in recent years with spiralling social problems and economic gloom after the decline of its once famed fishing industry.
But now forward thinking business leaders in the town are hoping to turn around its fortunes by reigniting interest in its bleak dockland area.
The plan is varied and includes backing renewable energy, reinvigorating its waterfront and even using it as a Hollywood set.
The town as a whole is also undergoing £28.2million worth of renovations to the waterfront, a shopping centre and a bridge.
Richard Askam is the project director of Projekt Renewable (PRG) - a new enterprise tasked with promoting local opportunities in sustainable energy.
It’s even better in the flesh. PROJEKT RENEWABLE looking moody at Alexandra Dock. And it has arrived 4 months ahead of schedule. Well played @richardaskam1 pic.twitter.com/JWKkZnNusk
— Will Douglas ?????????????????? (@mrwilldouglas) August 22, 2023
He spoke to the Telegraph about his hopes - with the publication saying that “for many” the town was “overrun with scroungers and hooligans.”
He wants to turn the company's site, on Alexandra Dock, into an renewable energy education and tourism hub, running boat tours to the turbines of the Humber Gateway wind farm.
The development is a solar-powered box park of shipping containers which opened in 2023 and is dubbed an “immersive educational and cultural destination” by North East Lincolnshire Council. It features art installations and local business pop-ups.
He said: “We want to activate this area, remind people there’s water in their town,” reports the Telegraph.
When the site launched last year Askam said: “Designed to allow everyone to see and hear the opportunity that already exists in our area but is still largely hidden.
"It’s time to write the next chapter in Grimsby’s history, and that is as a world leader in renewable energy.”
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Will Douglas is another local trying to turn around the town’s fortunes - and drag people back to the port by transforming a 19th-century mission church into Docks Beers - a craft brewery and food destination with its own festival, DocksFest.
He said: “We wanted to be close to the docks, in an iconic building, making beers with names reflecting the people.
“We felt if we got the story right, we had a chance of success – it could be a destination,” reports The Telegraph.
And the ambitious plans for Grimsby don’t stop there…with hopes to become a Hollywood set, as it has previously been used by Netflix and StudioCanal.
"Build it and hopefully they will come," is the belief of Emma Lingard, a resident who once worked in TV but is now a manager at Associated British Ports (ABP), the owners of Grimsby Docks.
"Every producer or location manager that has come to us is saying that London is overpriced," she told Sky News.
"They're finding there are too many other productions jostling for the same space... so they're looking up North."
Seventy percent of the UK’s fish is still processed at the dock, but all has not been great in the last few years for the town.
In 2022 a study by iLiveHere rated the coastal Lincolnshire town as the 18th worst place to live in the UK.
Grimsby was described in the rankings as “backward, cold and unfriendly”.
Residents, however, reacted with pride to their hometown, despite its perceived faults.
