Southampton gets £500,000 for new Sea City Museum study (From Daily Echo)
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Southampton gets £500,000 for new Sea City Museum study
11:57am Monday 30th March 2009 in
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- By Peter Law » Feature Writer
PLANS for a world-class tourist attraction about Southampton’s part in the Titanic story were set to take a major step forward today – with a £500,000 cash windfall.
Sea City Museum, which will be built in the west wing of Southampton’s Civic Centre, is to feature a massive climb-aboard replica of the doomed liner.
Visitors to the £28m museum will experience life on board the illfated voyage from the perspective of the crew, many of who were from Southampton.
The plan will receive a boost today as the Heritage Lottery Fund awards almost £500,000 in development funding – with the potential for a further £4.5m towards construction.
Work could start late next year and Southampton City Council is desperate for doors to open in April 2012 – the 100th anniversary of the tragedy.
The council’s leisure boss described it as the city’s most significant landmark development for a generation that could draw hundreds of thousands of people.
Visitors will go on a journey experiencing the day the liner left Southampton’s docks, to life on board for crew and the subsequent inquiry and discovery of the wreckage.
Councillor John Hannides, Cabinet member for leisure, culture and heritage, said: “Southampton was the home of the Titanic so it is only fitting that we tell our story. When the ship sank 549 Southampton people lost their lives and hundreds of families in the city were directly affected.”
The announcement is a much needed boost for the city after the regional development agency Seeda pulled its funding for a £4.6m revamp of Guildhall Square.
The civic centre’s old magistrate courts and police station will be turned into a dockside scene showing Titanic about to depart.
The museum will feature thousands of Titanic artefacts.
The council has two years to submit full proposals to compete for a further £4.5m of lottery cash.
Comments(18)
thesaint
says...
12:47pm Mon 30 Mar 09
Bartonian
says...
12:54pm Mon 30 Mar 09
Redback
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1:39pm Mon 30 Mar 09
King Mush
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2:14pm Mon 30 Mar 09
Redback wrote:Sorry to disagree but the Titanic story has far more reaching aspects than just a 'boat sinking'
This City could do with more looking forward, and less revelling in the past. People bang on about Southampton's "heritage", yet stacks of cities have a FAR more interesting history. A long time ago, a big boat sank. Get over it. A Titanic memorial does not address the most important question: Where NOW for Southampton? Unless we start broaching that, I fear Bartonian is all too correct.
It was one of the first ever major losses of life in transportation and jolted the government into implementing better safety at sea with regard to the woeful lack of lifeboats.
She did have more than the bare minimum, based on the tonnage of the ship but the builders were not keen on 'spoiling the sightlines' with the necessary lifeboats and capacity for some 2,500 passengers.
They only had room for half of the 1912 sailing and many of these were launched with far less escaping passengers and crew.
It also highlighted the passing of the Edwardian 'class' based society although the dak clouds of war were gathering across Europe.
Southampton was deeply affected by losing so many local crew and most homes in old Northam and Chapel lost a dear family breadwinner.
I feel that the whingers should maybe try reading (or lazy Googling) about this whole tale of arrogance, mistakes, bad luck and much more.
We have a rich history in this city and it has always been an important part of England's past.
Why not celebrate this heritage and (hopefully) attract more visitors?
Boris Remmington
says...
3:08pm Mon 30 Mar 09
Major Sir Jerry Pending
says...
3:17pm Mon 30 Mar 09
Should build it at St Mary's Stadium where SFC are just as doomed to sink without trace
King Mush
says...
6:53pm Mon 30 Mar 09
Boris Remmington wrote:lol
It would be better to equate Southamptons history to that of the Titanic...started glitzy and sinking fast
Good one
Likewise Derek's and the Major!
Vonnie
says...
3:08am Tue 31 Mar 09
I am sick to death of hearing about it. There were bigger shipping disasters with equal loss of life, both before and after 1912, but for some reason, the maiden voyage of the Titanic caught the public's imagination.
Since the event, every man and his dog has tried to make capital out of it. I went to the exhibition in London for work purposes, and I felt that some of what was being done in the name of entertainment and education was sick and in extremely bad taste.
Let the poor devils who died on the Titanic rest in peace.
snapperdownunder
says...
3:18am Tue 31 Mar 09
Vonnie wrote:Here, here, Vonnie.
The story of the Titanic is one very tiny peice of Southampton's history, and very definitely not the most important event to have occurred in, or been part of, the City's heritage.
I am sick to death of hearing about it. There were bigger shipping disasters with equal loss of life, both before and after 1912, but for some reason, the maiden voyage of the Titanic caught the public's imagination.
Since the event, every man and his dog has tried to make capital out of it. I went to the exhibition in London for work purposes, and I felt that some of what was being done in the name of entertainment and education was sick and in extremely bad taste.
Let the poor devils who died on the Titanic rest in peace.
Also, I wonder if the council will be able to keep it open for the tourists it will no doubt attract.
It was only this last week that the Echo reported the wages debacle which has forced the Sunday closing of three of the city's top attractions.
Ben Doone
says...
8:37am Tue 31 Mar 09
The 'Titanic' does have some considerable local and international historical relevance and, with the success of the film, could well be classed as an 'attraction'. If the exhibition is done professionally it is likely to be a commercial success which, in today's world it has to be
Derek of Dibden Purlieu
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9:17am Tue 31 Mar 09
Could you share the names of the vessels concerned?
Bright Spark
says...
9:48am Tue 31 Mar 09
The Titanic, a British ocean liner, sank in the Atlantic with the loss of more than 1,500 lives.
1914
Steamship the Empress of Ireland sank after a collision in St Lawrence River, Quebec, Canada, killing 1,024.
1915 RMS Lusitania torpedoed off the south coast of Ireland with the loss of 1,198 lives,
1940
Cunard liner Lancastria at 16,000 tons far smaller than Titanic was bombed and strafed by German aircraft with the loss of approx 4,000 lives off St Nazaire.
1945
Wilhelm Gustloff, a cruise ship carrying German refugees, was destroyed by a Soviet submarine in the Baltic, killing an estimated 9,000 people.
1948
The Kiangya, a Chinese steamship, sank after hitting a mine during the Chinese civil war, killing as many as 3,920.
1954
Toya Maru, a Japanese freightliner, sank in a typhoon, killing 1,172.
1987
The Dona Paz ferry sank after colliding with the tanker Vector in the Sibuyan Sea in the Philippines. The accident cost 4,375 lives on the ferry and 11 on the tanker.
In the same year, a British ferry, the Herald of Free Enterprise, capsized in the English Channel, killing 193 people.
1991
The Salem Express ferry sank after hitting coral outside the Red Sea port of Safaga, killing 464 people.
1993
The Neptune, a ferry, sank west of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, killing several hundred.
1994
The ferry Estonia sank off the Finnish island of Utoe, en route from Tallinn to Stockholm, killing 852.
2000
The Indonesian ferry Cahaya Bahari sank off the coast of Sulawesi, killing around 550 people.
2001
An overcrowded fishing boat carrying asylum seekers to Australia from Lampung, in Sumatra, sank in international waters between Indonesia and Australia, killing 353 people.
2002
The Joola, a Senegalese ferry designed to carry 550 people, capsized off the Gambian coast, killing 1,863 people. In the same year, the MV Salahuddin-2, a Bangladeshi ferry, sank in the Meghna River, south of Dhaka, killing more than 450.
2003
The MV Nasreen, a Bangladeshi ferry, sank in the monsoon-swollen Meghna river, south-east of Dhaka, killing up to 400 people.
2006
The Salam Boccaccio 98, an Egyptian ferry, sank in the Red Sea carrying more than 1,300 people. There were at least 100 survivors.
I'm sure that there were many other disasters as well as these shipmate.
Vonnie
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10:43am Tue 31 Mar 09
Bright Spark
says...
12:24pm Tue 31 Mar 09
Miles Sway
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1:14pm Tue 31 Mar 09
In context then there were no larger disasters prior to Titanic and only 2 non-wartime disasters since, neither having any connection to Southampton?
FYI I agree with you, the fascination will die out and I for one won't miss it. They have a Titanic exhibition here (Halifax) as many survivors were brought here afterwards. It's quite poignant but takes up only small space in a very good maritime museum (and Halifax has no-where near the history of S'oton).
For Southampton to have this obsession with Titanic seems so wrong what about the Mayflower, didn't sink but arguably considerably more important in the scheme of things? Why not a living full size replica of that?.
pukeko
says...
12:00pm Wed 1 Apr 09
Redback wrote:That’s a lightly callous one, basically saying “let’s forget 1502 souls that died”, a lesson learned and an piece of marine history, not to mention remembrance, all going hand in hand with Southampton’s history. Maybe there are not as many items of history in Southampton as other cities, but preserve heritage that you do have, that and the Spitfire idea, that would be the clear answer to bringing Southampton’s history on par with other places. Also it might be the no brainer answer to the decline. The typical attitude of those who go on about looking forward, are the ones who like to build new ugly boring buildings, like those rancid apartments down the marina there. No wonder the city is in decline, apart from the yuppies that love that sort of soulless 'vista', and the constant identity crisis type attitude of “out with the old, in with the new.”
This City could do with more looking forward, and less revelling in the past. People bang on about Southampton's "heritage", yet stacks of cities have a FAR more interesting history. A long time ago, a big boat sank. Get over it. A Titanic memorial does not address the most important question: Where NOW for Southampton? Unless we start broaching that, I fear Bartonian is all too correct.
The Titanic idea and a large maritime museum more to the scale of what Portsmouth has with its naval should have been in Soton years ago. the current maritime museum is quaint,. but is more a museum for a village with a maritime history, not the renowned seaport city of England. Looking back is looking forward.
An ovation for the council for this decision.
Redback
says...
12:22pm Wed 1 Apr 09
The majority of the rest of your post I agree with to some extent. The city certainly doesn't need any more identikit apartments and offices, it needs a bit of imagination. I don't think a museum is the best way forward, but how successful it is will of course depend upon the execution of the idea.
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Bright Spark says...
12:32pm Mon 30 Mar 09