More than 160 businesses and organisations are being asked - how do you see the future of Scarborough?

North Yorkshire County Council is the latest to reply to the questionnaire designed to help the Yorkshire Coast Economic Development Partnership plan the future of the region.

The questions come at a time when the economic base of the seaside resort is being eroded, when it is remote from urban areas, and traditional industries like fishing and agriculture are undergoing major changes.

The partnership, a joint venture between Scarborough Borough Council and North Yorkshire Training & Enterprise Council, also wants to know how to overcome the lack of investment in industry, commerce, conservation of historic towns and villages and creation of new jobs.

And it calls for suggestions on how to improve even further the development of manufacturing industry, particularly in Scarborough town - development which has helped to offset the decline in traditional industries.

Ray Williamson, economic development officer for Scarborough, said: "We sent the questionnaires to all the principal businesses like Plaxtons coachbuilders, Pindar and McCains Foods as well as organisations like the Scarborough district Business Association and a whole variety of tourist-related organisations. We also sought the views of the county council, the Rural Development Commission and English partnerships."

Around 20 per cent had now replied and their views would be made known next week at a meeting of the Scarborough economic development committee.

One of the major problems, said Mr Williamson, was that over the last 20 years changes in holiday-taking had fundamentally and continually eroded the main economic base of coastal resorts. There was no sudden collapse of an industry which had alerted the Government. The erosion was slower, more insidious.

"One of our main concerns is that Government has constantly not taken notice of changes in seaside resorts, yet we are not getting the level of public resources needed to tackle the problem.

Among observations made by the county council were that:

Isolation has its advantages such as being a strong shopping area because of the difficulty for residents getting to other regional towns;

The ready accessibility of Northern Europe needs to be exploited more for business and tourism;

Funds were available from Europe to help fishing and agriculture industries diversify, grants already managed by the county council.

Attracting investment in industry, in leisure and in conservation of historic towns and villages was the key to creating expanding local business markets and increasing local confidence. "It is important to continue to advocate for public funds to be available to support such investments."

While it was important to continue supporting larger enterprises within the borough, the development had to be encouraged of smaller manufacturing enterprises.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.