A BLACKPOOL heritage centre could become a time-tunnel into the history of seaside resorts around the country.

That is the hope of the town's Civic Trust, whose secretary Elaine Smith is campaigning for a full-scale heritage centre in the resort.

"Blackpool has millions of visitors each year and no heritage centre," said Mrs Smith. "If you go to other places, even the tiniest villages often have one.

"Blackpool needs something different for people to go to and for schoolchildren to learn from.

"It wouldn't just be about Blackpool's history but, as the country's premier resort, we can be a centre for seaside heritage as well as perhaps the history of transport, with the trams, trains and lifeboats.

"It's something that can be added to and it would create jobs for the town."

Mrs Smith and Civic Trust chairman Barry Shaw have been exploring funding - possibly through the Blackpool Challenge Partnership, a public/private body with millions of pounds of special regeneration funds at its disposal to rejuvenate the resort's economy and social wellbeing.

A bid for a new tranche of money is going into the government soon, focused on tourism and the heritage project will be part of it.

Another possible source could be the national lottery heritage fund.

Blackpool South MP Gordon Marsden, a historian, is fully behind the plan: "The key thing is that any heritage centre should be able to attract the maximum number of visitors by not just concentrating on Blackpool but linking it to a subject of wider interest, like the history of seaside resorts or transport," he said.

"If we are to bid for funding it's not just a question of getting the money to build it but also to demonstrate it can run itself viably and not become a white elephant."

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