Largo Pier: £2m bill halts community bid to restore historic pier savaged by 'Beast From The East'
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Largo Communities Together held a public meeting on Tuesday night to lay its cards on the table.
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Hide AdThe pier was badly damaged by the ‘Beast From The East’ in February 2018, and while storms are not unknown, this one swept a huge chunk of it away in one fell swoop.
In the immediate aftermath, a small group of residents held a public meeting and the message was clear - Largo wanted to see its pier restored. That group subsequently joined LCT.
Four years on, it will take some £2m to do just that, and with hopes of major funding dashed, the group’s aims are stymied.
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Hide AdThe pier is owned by the Crusoe Hotel, but it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with LCT for it to be transferred to community ownership and be restored.
Louise Robb, chair of the trustees, said: “We need to be able to tell the community where we have got to and how we can’t go any further despite having all the work and support in place.
“After the ‘Beast From The East’ people were very vocal - they wanted it restored to its original heritage. Since then, a huge amount of work has done by a team of volunteers with a lot of help from skilled, experienced people - architects, civil engineers, legal experts and pier engineers. We have had designs and drawings done and built up a bank of usable plans and reports.”
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Hide AdThe meeting on Tuesday was open all residents to ask questions and get the latest update from the group which fears if nothing happens then the pier will deteriorate further.
Storm damage isn’t new - 1926 saw the pier reportedly being "completely cut in two" by raging seas - but the severity of the impact is.
Added Louise: “Since the Beast from the East, the Pier has suffered further storm damage - and they are becoming increasingly frequent.”
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Hide AdThe drive to take ownership of the pier and carry out the work saw some £70,000 raised to enable detailed drawings and plans to be drawn up, but the £2m bill rested heavily on securing major funding.
The trust has gone to every organisation including the National Lottery without success. Hopes of landing up to £700,000 from Leven Reconnected also faltered as its financial input came with the caveat the work had to be done by March 2026, which means the work would need to be completed over Summer 2025. This is not possible due to the length of time it would take to finalise designs and tendering process.
Brendan Diamond, co-chair of the Pier Group and a trustee, said: “We have run out of road. This is a £2m project which we would have had to start by March 2025 at the latest - we are at the stage we just can’t go any further with public funding all up in the air right now.
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Hide Ad“We have tried everything. We have been to Scottish Government Ministers and asked for a delay of the funding dates and were told no.”
Louise added: “We have done the very best we can. The work done to date has been enormous and it is all sitting there waiting on funding.
“And there is a potential issue for the people who live near the Pier. It may act as a breakwater in terms of protecting adjacent homes. That security might not be there in years to come…”
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Hide AdWhen it launched its pier project in 2020, LCT asked: “Can you envisage Largo without the Pier and the Harbour?”
It described the structure as “an integral part of Lower Largo” - one which has featured in countless paintings, postcards and photographs, hosted Galloways paddle steamers, tattie schooners loading their cargoes, the local fishing fleets entering and leaving under sail and the Pierrot shows.
In 2020, it warned: “ For a number of reasons, Largo Pier is in a desperate state and another severe winter storm may destroy it entirely. All that heritage and history will be reduced to a pile of rocks. It is our aim to ensure this does not happen.”
The next steps could be determined by the outcome on Tuesday’s meeting.
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