Resorts’ cliff lifts are to remain shut

CLIFF LIFTS in Scarborough and Whitby are to remain closed for the foreseeable future.

Scarborough Borough Council has reported in its residents’ newsletter that water has been getting into the cliff shaft of Whitby’s Cliff Lift, on North Terrace, for many years. But more recently the situation, combined with the humid environment, has worsened.

“It is now at a point where elements of the lift structure are suffering from corrosion,” the council said. “Even new parts fitted at the beginning of one season require replacement the following one..”

Scarborough’s Spa Cliff lift is also closed after an issue discovered during a routine inspection. “As you’d expect with a piece of engineering that was first opened in the 1800s, there is likely to be the odd problem now and again,” the council said. “The main issue we need to address is the concrete roof of the motor room and the steelwork that supports it. Both are showing signs of deterioration. The motor room sits beneath the top station which complicates the situation, so we have asked a specialist engineer to come up with a fix.”

The council is now looking at ways of helping passengers with mobility issues to get between the top and bottom of both cliffs. The Scarborough South Cliff Tramway Company Ltd was created in 1873 to link South Cliff Esplanade to the Spa – at this point one of the most popular music venue outside of London. It opened on July 6, 1875 to great fanfare with 1,400 passengers paying one old penny for the novelty of using a cliff lift for the very first time.

Whitby Cliff Lift, which opened in 1931, consists of a vertical shaft down from the cliff top through the boulder-clay, leading to a 221ft-long pedestrian tunnel out to the beach.