What chance for the rest of us....

Budget hotel chain Travelodge is offloading 49 hotels to pay off debts including their own hotel on the seafront in Eastbourne. This is the very same hotel which has been busy undercutting us all with its £11 rooms and causing a few neighbouring establishments to go to the wall. Sometimes it seems,  that even in this business, there is justice in the world and you cannot carry on offering something for cheaper than it costs. I wish the new owners all the best in their venture.  

Tourist Information

The staff at Eastbourne's Tourist Information do a fantastic job but why is the Tourist Information Office shut on Good Friday, Easter Sunday and Easter Monday. Look at any other seaside town (for example Southend) and you will see that their Information Offices are open all hours so what about Eastbourne?  



Winter

If you think this is bad then below is a picture of Eastbourne during the 'great blizzard' of 1908.The local newspaper wrote,   "There is nothing that so utterly transforms a town as such a fall of snow as that of this week. It brings with it a rare witchery of beauty, yet a rare sense of desolation. The beauty is in the encrusting of the trees, the silvering of the bushes and the mantling of lawns in purest white. The effect of desolation was heightened by the profound hush. Indeed the strange effect of deep snow to the townsman is the silence that it brings”.

 

Bar prices

Looking at our bar prices which we think are rather reasonable....

 

Summer

Rail services

Very interested (and a bit amused) to hear that a faster rail journey from Eastbourne to London (70 minutes) might be on the cards but I am convinced that this is just not possible with the present railway infrastructure whereby all trains are funnelled through the bottle neck of East Croydon. I have repeatedly added my support to the idea of a new railway line using the former Lewes to Uckfield line and then to London via Tunbridge Wells or East Croydon. Improvements including better signalling, double deck trains and 16 car trains are just not going to do it and we need some radical thinking not lame posturing.

 

 

 

The true cost of Airbourne

In 2008, 48000 customers paying £5 each would raise £240 000 with losses of £360000 incurred. In 2012, 100000 residents plus 50000 visitors paying £1 each would raise £150000 and 30% of that is going to the RNLI leaving £105000.  We are told that this is sufficient to make the event ‘viable’

Is the problem with Airborne that no one is willing to tell us exactly how much it costs and exactly how much it brings in.  Only when we know that, can we make any informed judgement on whether the event is worthwhile or not.