| Broadstairs | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Viking Bay, Broadstairs | |
  Broadstairs Location withinKent | |
| Population | 24,903 (Broadstairs and St Peter's parish 2011)[1] |
| OS grid reference | TR395675 |
| • London | 81.6 miles (131.3 km) |
| Civil parish | |
| District | |
| Shire county | |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | Broadstairs |
| Postcode district | CT10 |
| Dialling code | 01843 |
| Police | Kent |
| Fire | Kent |
| Ambulance | South East Coast |
| UK Parliament | |
| 51°21′32″N1°26′22″E / 51.35888°N 1.43944°E /51.35888; 1.43944 | |
Broadstairs (/ˈbrɔːdstɛərz/)[2] is a coastal town on theIsle of Thanet in theThanet district of eastKent, England, about 80 miles (130 km) east of London. It is part of thecivil parish ofBroadstairs and St Peter's, which includesSt Peter's, and had a population in 2011 of about 25,000. Situated betweenMargate andRamsgate, Broadstairs is one of Thanet'sseaside resorts, known as the "jewel in Thanet's crown". The town's coat of arms' Latin motto isStella Maris ("Star of the Sea"). The name derives from a former flight of steps in the chalk cliff, which led from the sands up to the 11th-centuryshrine of St Mary on the cliff's summit.
The town spreads from Haine Road in the west toKingsgate (named after the landing ofKing Charles II in 1683), a hamlet in St Peter parish[3] in the north, and to Dumpton in the south (named after the yeoman Dudeman who farmed there in the 13th century). The hamlet of Reading (formerlyReden orRedyng) Street was established byFlemish refugees in the 17th century.
The inland village ofSt Peter's was established after the building of aparish church in about 1080.The coastal confederation ofCinque Ports during its mediæval period consisted of a confederation of 42 towns and villages in all. This included St Peter's, as a 'limb' ofDover.[4]On the nearby coast was a cliff-top shrine, theShrine of Our Lady, at what was then calledBradstow(e), meaning "broad place" (perhaps referring to the wide bay).[5]
A fishing settlement developed in the vicinity of the shrine in the 14th century.[citation needed] This came to be called "Broadstairs", after a flight of steps which was made in the cliff to give access to the shrine from the bay. Older forms of the name includeBrodsteyr Lynch (1434 & 1494[6]),Brodestyr (1479),Broadstayer (1565) andBrod stayrs (1610).[7] Charles Culmer, son of Waldemar, is supposed to have reconstructed the stairs in 1350.
In 1440, an archway was built by George Culmer across a track leading down to the sea, where the first wooden pier or jetty was built in 1460. A more enduring structure was to replace this in 1538, when the road leading to the seafront, known as Harbour Street, was cut into the rough chalk ground on which Broadstairs is built, by another George Culmer. Going further in defence of the town, he built the York Gate in 1540, a portal that still spans Harbour Street and which then held two heavy wooden doors that could be closed in times of threat from the sea.Richard Culmer was the son of Sir Richard Culmer by his first wife and was born in 1640/41.
Richard was buried in the parish church ofMonkton, on the Isle of Thanet. Of his legacies was theendowment on Broadstairs of an area of sixacres (24,000 m2) of ground for the poor of the parish. The name survives to this day as "Culmer's Allotment" as does the allotment.
In 1823, Broadstairs had a population of about 300.[8] A brief outline of the history of BroadstairsPier is given inBroadstairs, past and present, which mentions a storm in 1767, during which Culmer's work was all but destroyed. At this time, it was of considerable importance to the fishing trade with catches as far afield asGreat Yarmouth,Hastings,Folkestone,Dover andTorbay and elsewhere being landed. It had become so indispensable that the corporations of Yarmouth, Dover,Hythe andCanterbury with assistance from theEast India Company andTrinity House subscribed to its restoration with a payment of £2,000 in 1774.
By 1795, York Gate needed repair to repel any threat from theFrench Revolutionary Wars. The subsequent renovation was undertaken by Lord Hanniker in the same year as the firstlightvessel was placed on theGoodwin Sands.
On the occasion of the landing at Thanet of Major Henry Percy of the 14th Dragoon Guards, on 21 June 1815 with the captured French eagle standard taken atWaterloo, a tunnel stairway from the beach to the fields on the cliff tops above was excavated, and christened "Waterloo Stairs" to commemorate the event. Broadstairs was supposedly the first town in England to learn of this historic victory, although there is no written evidence of this.
Smuggling was an important industry in the area, and the men of Broadstairs and St Peter's became very good at outwittingcustoms agents. This was very profitable because of the very highduty payable on tea, spirits and tobacco. There is a network of tunnels and caves strewn in the chalk strata which were used bysmugglers to hide theircontraband.
By 1824steamboats were becoming more common, having begun to make over from the hoys and sailingpackets about 1814. These made trade with London much faster. The familiar sailing hoys took anything up to 72 hours to reachMargate from London, whereas the newsteamships were capable of making at least nine voyages in this time. Mixed feelings must have been strongly expressed by the Thanet boatmen in general, as the unrivalled speed of thesteam packet was outmanoeuvring all other classes of vessel, but it brought a new prosperity to Thanet.
The youngPrincess Victoria and her mother,the Duchess of Kent, were summer visitors 1826–1836, staying atPierremont Hall (in present-day Pierremont Park). The house was built in 1785 bySamuel Pepys Cockerell forThomas Douglas Forsyth, and later used as a school and an events venue.[9]
In the middle of the 19th century, the professional classes began to move in. By 1850, the population had reached about 3,000, doubling over the previous 50 years. Due to the freshsea air, many convalescent homes for children opened towards the end of the 19th century.[8]
Although numerousholidaymakers were attracted to Broadstairs and to otherThanet seaside towns during theVictorian era, it was not directly served by the railways until 1863. This was a time of great expansion for railways in theSouth East; in 1860Victoria Station had been completed, followed byCharing Cross andCannon Street. Rail access to Broadstairs had previously relied heavily upon coach links to other railway stations in the district or region; with firms such asBradstowe Coachmasters, operated by William Sackett and John Derby, principally involved. Their coaches connected Broadstairs toWhitstable station where a railway service had begun as early as 1830 (one of the first in England, with its pioneeringStephenson's engineInvicta).
In 1841, 44mariners were recorded as resident in Broadstairs; nine of these being specified as fishermen, and of course the residualboat-building activity that remained after the Culmer White yard closed in 1824 (under pressure from the steamships), still continued (though there were only fourshipwrights recorded in the census: Solomon Holbourn and Joseph Jarman among them). Others may have been at sea on census day: Steamer Point, as the pier head at Broadstairs was then known, would have been fairly busy with shipping movements sinceconsignments ofcoal and other produce would have been traded along the coast and there would have been regular work on the steam packet to and fromRamsgate. By the 1840s, the smuggling had ceased.[8]
By 1910, the population had reached about 10,000. A "guide book" of the 1930s by A.H. Simison (the photographic chemist) entitledRamsgate (The Kent Coast at its best) Pictorially Presented, describes Broadstairs town as having approached modernisation and urban development "always with a consistent policy of retaining those characteristics for which it has for so long been renowned". The town has retained many aspects of historical interest, besides itsmaritime history. Amongst these is its notablereligious history, evoked by places such as theShrine of Our Lady, Bradstowe.
Morelli's Ice Cream Parlour opened in 1932 and retains its distinctive 1957 refurbished interior.[10][11]
Broadstairs is within the Thanetlocal government district. The town contains the five electoralwards of Bradstowe, St Peter's, Beacon Road, Viking and Kingsgate. These wards have eleven of the fifty six seats on theThanet District Council. The2023 Local Elections saw major changes in the political make-up of Broadstairs, with the Conservative Party retaining only four of their previously held eight seats. Four seats were won by the Labour Party, two by the Greens with an Independent taking the remaining seat. Broadstairs and St Peter's Town Council has 15 members, who are elected every four years, led by the mayor.[12]
TheMember of Parliament (MP) forEast Thanet isPolly Billington of theLabour Party. She has been the constituency's MP since the2024 general election.
Broadstairs and St Peter's have been twinned withWattignies in northern France since the early 1980s.[13]
The town lies above a harbour with cliffs on either side. It has seven bays of golden sand, which are (from south to north) Dumpton Gap, Louisa Bay, Viking Bay, Stone Bay, Joss Bay, Kingsgate Bay andBotany Bay.North Foreland rises between Stone Bay and Joss Bay.
On the cliffs above Kingsgate Bay isKingsgate Castle, formerly part of the estate of Lord Holland but now converted into private residences.
Broadstairs has a very mildmaritime climate.
| Broadstairs and St Peter's | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 UK census | Broadstairs and St Peter's | Thanet District | England |
| Total population | 24,370 | 126,702 | 49,138,831 |
| Foreign born | 5.3% | 5.1% | 9.2% |
| White | 98% | 98% | 91% |
| Asian | 1.0% | 0.6% | 4.6% |
| Black | 0.2% | 0.3% | 2.3% |
| Christian | 75% | 74% | 72% |
| Muslim | 0.4% | 0.5% | 3.1% |
| Hindu | 0.3% | 0.2% | 1.1% |
| No religion | 14% | 16% | 15% |
| 65+ years old | 24% | 22% | 16% |
| Unemployed | 2.9% | 4.4% | 3.3% |
At the2001 UK census, the parish ofBroadstairs and St Peter's had 24,370 residents in 10,597 households. Of those households, 34.2% were married couples, 6.7% werecohabiting couples and 8.3% were lone parents. 31.8% of all households were made up of individuals, and 20.9% had someone living alone at pensionable age. 25.7% of households included children aged under 16, or a person aged 16 to 18 who was in full-time education.[14]
The parish has a low proportion of non-white people compared with national figures; the ethnicity recorded in the 2001 census was 97.9% white, 0.7% mixed race, 0.3% Chinese, 0.7% other Asian, 0.2% black and 0.2% other.[14] The number of foreign-born residents is relatively low; the place of birth of residents in 2001 was 94.7% United Kingdom, 0.7% Republic of Ireland, 0.5% Germany, 0.9% other Western Europe countries, 0.3% Eastern Europe, 0.8% Africa, 0.6% South Asia, 0.5% Far East, 0.3% North America, 0.2% Middle East, 0.2% Oceania and 0.1% South America.[14] Religion was recorded as 75.3% Christian, 0.4% Muslim, 0.3% Hindu, 0.3% Buddhist and 0.3% Jewish. 14.3% were recorded as having no religion, 0.5% had an alternative religion and 8.6% did not state their religion.[14]
The age distribution was 5% aged 0–4 years, 14% aged 5–15 years, 5% aged 16–19 years, 26% aged 20–44 years, 27% aged 45–64 years and 24% aged 65 years and over. There was a high percentage of residents over 65, compared with the national average of 16%, mainly due to seaside towns being popular retirement destinations. For every 100 females, there were 87.1 males.[15]
At the 2001 census, the economic activity of residents aged 16–74 was 34.1% in full-time employment, 12.8% in part-time employment, 10.0% self-employed, 2.9% unemployed, 2.3% students with jobs, 4.1% students without jobs, 20.0% retired, 6.5% looking after home or family, 4.9% permanently sick or disabled and 2.4% economically inactive for other reasons. The percentage of retired people was significantly higher than the national figure of 14%. The percentage of unemployed people was low compared with the national rate of 3.4% and the district rate of 4.4%. Only 12% of residents aged 16–74 had ahigher education qualification or the equivalent, compared with 20% nationwide. TheOffice for National Statistics estimated that during the period of April 2001 to March 2002, the average gross weekly income of households was £522 (£27,219 per year).[14]
The industry of employment of residents, at the 2001 census, was 15% retail, 14% health and social work, 13% manufacturing, 13% education, 10% real estate, 8% construction, 7% transport and communications, 6% public administration, 5% hotels and restaurants, 3% finance, 1% agriculture and 5% other community, social or personal services. Compared with national figures, there was a relatively high number of workers in the education and health/social care industries and a relatively low number in finance and real estate.[14] Many residents commute to work outside the town; at the 2001 census, the town had 9,842 employed residents, but there were only 9,049 jobs within the town.[14]
As a seaside resort, the economy is mainly based around tourism; there are hotels and guest houses on and near the seafront to accommodate the influx of all-year-round visitors. Although the number of hotels in recent years has declined because of the high land redevelopment values, this has resulted in an improvement in quality of the existing premises. The High Street has a wide variety of independent shops and services and there are several factories, mainly situated on the small industrial estates on the town's borders. The above-average population age has led to many health- and social-care jobs at local care homes. At the 2001 UK census, 1.8% of the population resided in a medical or care establishment, which is more than double the national average of only 0.8%.[14] Many jobs in education are provided by the town's relatively high number of schools and colleges.
There is a small cinema, "The Palace Cinema" (formerly known as The Windsor), in Harbour Street.
More recently, a new event has been added to the mix – the Big Broadstairs Weekend. Starting the season in May, the event is themed, comprises a dance at the Pavilion on the Friday night, Film on the Beach on the Saturday night and a Guinness World Record Attempt on the Sunday. Broadstairs currently holds the record for biggest remote dance class.[19]
The beaches atBotany Bay and Joss Bay were awarded theBlue flag rural beach award in 2005. Viking Bay beach, the main beach in Broadstairs, won the Blue Flag in 2006.[citation needed] In summer, this bay is often very busy with tourists enjoying cafes and ice-cream outlets. On Harbour Street, the Pavilion on the Sands hosts a summer show and all-year entertainment, with extensive views across the bay. Its location and facilities make the Pavilion a popular wedding venue.
The Dickens House Museum on the seafront, displays many artefacts relating to Charles Dickens and his life in Broadstairs. Crampton Tower by the railway station houses a museum containingThomas Russell Crampton's working drawings, models, graphics, patents, awards and artefacts connected to his life and works. Other galleries illustrate the history and development of the railways, the electric tramways, road transport and other aspects of local industry. The original Broadstairs stagecoach, built in 1860, is displayed alongside seven working model railways in gauges N, OO, O and Gauge One.[citation needed]
The town is situated 20 miles (32 km) from bothDover andCanterbury, and about 67 miles (108 km) from theM25, London's orbital motorway.
In 1851, the region's rail network was supplemented by the London tosouth coast route, including the coastal link fromChichester toRamsgate, thecross-country service between London andDover and theMid-Kent line that linkedRedhill,Tonbridge andAshford to London's first Eurostar terminal atWaterloo (opened in 1848).Broadstairs station (unlike neighbouring Margate) is a 10-minute walk from the beach. Although rebuilt in the 1920s, electricity was not installed at the station until well into the 1970s, and the buildings and platforms remained illuminated bygaslight until then.
Since 2009Southeastern have been operating ahigh speed train service betweenLondon St Pancras andAshford International which then runs on to Broadstairs at conventional speed cutting about 40 minutes from what was once a two-hour journey to other termini in London. It is unusual in that trains to London can run either way through the station.
Lifeboats arrived in Broadstairs in 1851. News of the loss of the Irish packetRoyal Adelaide with 250 lives, on the sands off Margate on 6 April 1850, may have been the prompt that led old Thomas White to present one of his lifeboats to his home town of Broadstairs that summer. The lifeboat saw its first use on 6 March 1851, when thebrigMary White became trapped on theGoodwin Sands during a severe gale blowing from the north. A ballad was written to celebrate the occasion, "Song of the Mary White".
Solomon Holbourn of Broadstairs,coxswain of theMary White, had an aunt, Sophia, who married William Stevenson atFolkestone in 1813. Their eldest son, also William, became a mariner and boatman and in 1839 married Elizabeth Wellard at St Peter's, Broadstairs. In 1848 they had a son, again named William, who in adult life was better known as Bill "Floaty" Stevenson, and became a member of theFrances Forbes Barton lifeboat crew. The "Frances Forbes Barton" was originally, in 1897, the legacy of a Miss Webster to the boatmen of Broadstairs. It is recorded as having remained at that station until 1912, when it was moved tothe Walmer station when the Broadstairs station closed. In its time at Broadstairs it had been launched 77 times and saved 115 lives, by far the most effective of theRNLI craft stationed there.
Broadstairs' lifeboats were further supported by a fund established in the 1860s bySir Charles Reed FSA.
Infant and Primary
Secondary Modern and Grammar
Junior and Preparatory
Senior schools
The originalShrine of Our Ladye Star of the Sea is believed to date back to at least the 11th century.[23] The chapel on what is now Albion St was destroyed by a storm in the 16th century but was restored in 1601. It gives its name to the Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady Star of the Sea in Broadstairs.
The Anglican parish church is Holy Trinity, dating from 1830,[24] and which was described by Dickens as "a hideous temple of flint, like a petrified haystack".[23] The church of St. Peter-in-Thanet has one of the longest churchyards in England.[citation needed]
Sea swimming is popular, especially on the beach at Viking Bay, which is patrolled by lifeguards during the summer.[25] Dickens swam here[26] and British comedian Frank Muir grew up as a 'Beach Boy' in the town, describing his experience in the sea and on 'the sands' in a chapter of his autobiography.[27]
There are public toilets at the beach level in Viking Bay, but no changing facilities and one very basic freshwater shower (summer only). There is a freshwater tap at the bottom of the steps at the north end of the bay.
The bay is marked by striped posts on rocks at either end. The bay is alternately full of water at high tide or completely dry at low tide. At high tide, the beach shelf drops off quickly and a swimmer can be out of their depth within a few feet of the shore. At middle and low tides, the shelf is much more gently sloping and it is possible to play in the surf, and even swim, in water that is only waist high. At high tide and middle tide, swimmers that stay within the bay (within the posts) are completely sheltered from the tidal stream of the English Channel. At any tide, swimmers venturing out beyond the striped posts may encounter a strong tidal current running parallel to the coast, flowing either from south to north or north to south, depending on whether the tide is coming up the English Channel or draining out through it.Even strong experienced swimmers will find it difficult to make progress against this tidal stream at its greatest flow,[28] and swimmers in difficulty should swim directly towards the nearest part of the shore, rather than try to return to the point where they originally entered.
Stone Bay to the north of Viking Bay also has a lifeguard in summer and attracts swimmers at all times of the year.
Broadstairs has only one paid-for newspaper, theIsle of Thanet Gazette. Its sister publication, theThanet Times, closed in October 2012 after 116 years; both were owned byNorthcliffe Media.[29] Free newspapers for the town include theThanet Extra, part of theKM Group; andyourthanet, part ofKOS Media.Isle magazine is published quarterly and includes listings of events as well as accommodation and tourist information.The Broadstairs Beacon magazine has been published three times a year since 2019 and is available online or in printed form for free at several places in the town.
Local radio stations areKMFM Thanet, owned by the KM Group,community radio stationAcademy FM (Thanet); and the county-wide stationsHeart South,Gold andBBC Radio Kent. Thanet Community Radio also offer an online community podcasting service for Ramsgate, Broadstairs, Margate and the wider areas of Thanet.[30]National broadcasting channels includeBBC South East andITV Meridian (East)
 | This article's list of peoplemay not follow Wikipedia'sverifiability policy. Pleaseimprove this article by removing names that do not have independentreliable sources showing they merit inclusion in this article AND are members of this list, or by incorporating the relevant publications into the body of the article through appropriatecitations.(August 2018) |
People from Broadstairs are called Bradstonians.
22 May 2011 Largest remote dance class, Dancing Queens, Broadstairs
 | Unparished areas | |
|---|---|---|
| Civil parishes | ||
| Other settlements | ||
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Geographic | |
