How Portishead and Weston super mare differ.

By 1870 Portishead was a peaceful exclusive resort that the wealthy went to too relax. Weston super mare was already quite different because the pier attracted day trippers, who were often miners and they spent a rowdy day drunk and having fun. From here these towns went their own ways depending on several factors; piers, natural features, modes of access and types of accommodation. By the 1900 they are completely different.

Weston super mare had the first massive advantage of having a huge flat beach, which in comparison to the rocky aria in Portishaed was very attractive and a lot more comfortable. It was long enough for the men and women to have separate bathing arias and flat enough for bathing machines to run on Portishead on the other hand had Rodmoor marsh lands and a small rocky beach which did not allow these things to take place. When the Bank Holiday Act was brought in, in 1871 it allowed the poor, more common people to escape for a day, when they went to the sea side they looked for different things, they wanted entertainment and fun and as Weston had developed such things as a fun fair on knights stone island and a promenade, Birnbeck pier was the largest attraction with all the thrill of being out over the water and having fun with friends at the same time. Portishead stayed exclusive by doing things like having a toll road, Adelaide terrace (the upper class rental aria) and using the rocky beach to fill the saltings which were the Portishead equivalent of Weston former knights stone island run by Doctor Fox.

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In June 1841 a railway link to the great western railway had opened in Weston this led to excursion travel in 1851 which was cheap, the station was near the beach. On the other hand Portishead had no passenger railway until 1904 (goods trains by 1867) and even then the station was near the docks. This meant that through the whole time frame that I am looking at, Weston had a cheep passenger railway link and Portishead did not. Portishead was accessed by expensive horse and carriage which would have only been done by the rich. At the end of birnbeck pier there was a docking station that paddle steamers would stop off at and, on bank holidays, off load hundreds off welsh miners③. Where as at Portisheads pier even though paddle steamers did drop people off to drink at the royal inn, there were not as many because they could find pubs a lot nearer home, also the great tidal change caused a big problem.

In Portishead there was only one hotel and that was the royal, built in 1830, it was not a new attraction and, in comparison to Weston’s hotels like the grand Atlantic, was small and uninteresting. The other forum of accommodation in Portishead is Adelaide terrace, this was purpose built accommodation intended for the rich to rent for months at a time and bring family and servants to stay with them. Weston has the royal terrace which, when I was stood in front of it, looked like a larger more attractive yet very similar version. When compared the terrace at Weston would be a better option for staying in①.

In Weston there were two farmers which built and developed most of the land Cox and parsley. They built houses in fashionable bath stone and sold and rented them as interest grew there were other investors but as they did not own the expanse of land they could not be as influential as them. In Portishead the Bristol city council was responsible for most of the land and they developed it in a different way. They went for a more industrial type of investment and developed business ② rather than attractions like Weston did.

From the work that I have done you can see that Weston continued to develop as a sea side town because of the natural features and easy accessibility. On the other hand Portishead did not because most of the money that was invested was put into business and not pleasure attractions; it also lacked natural features like a sandy beach.

①.for the less well off there was boarding house where people who owned property would cram their family into one room and rent out the rest of it to holiday makers

② The docks and the gas works were to that were heavily invested in

③