Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Plate 8.1:
Blackpool Pier, England.
The Victorians built piers to enable
promenading as well as to represent
humans dominating and taming nature
(i.e. the coast and sea).
antecedents (e.g. the role of developers in developing resorts for different social classes).
Using the resort life cycle developed by Butler (1980), various factors were used to
explain similarities and differences in development paths and the resulting morphological
structure of the resort. D.G.Pearce (1995a) identified the problem of tourism functions
being added to existing urban centres in coastal locations where a day trip market may
also exist. What Pearce concluded was that 'a spectrum of coastal resorts exists, ranging
from those with a wholly tourist function, notably the new planned resorts, to those where
a significant amount of tourist activity occurs alongside a variety of other functions'
(D.G.Pearce 1995a:137). Interestingly, this reiterates the earlier typology developed by
La very (1971c) in a recreational context, where a similar notion of a continuum was
implicit but not explicitly developed. What Pearce (1995a) could have added is that the
recreational market in many resorts will numerically outnumber the tourist market,
though the behaviour of the former is very much climatically conditioned and
opportunistic.
Among the most widely cited models of the resort is Stansfield and Rickert's (1970)
discussion of the impact of consumption on resort morphology. Their resulting model,
identified as the Recreational Business District (RBD), utilised earlier concepts from
urban morphology models where central place functions of urban centres exist. The RBD,
as distinct from the CBD, was viewed as the locale for recreational services and
activities. Stansfield and Rickert (1970:215) defined the RBD as 'the seasonally oriented
linear aggregation of restaurants, various specialty food stands, candy stores and a varied
array of novelty and souvenir shops which cater to visitors' leisurely shopping needs'.
Although the model was based only on two New Jersey seaside resorts, the important
distinction for current cultural interest in coastal recreation and tourism was that the RBD
was not only an economic manifestation but also a social phenomenon. Similar
relationships between the CBD, which is spatially detached from the RBD in resorts, was
an important focus for research in the 1970s and 1980s. Had such models been developed
