A cafe owner has told how his business has been left marooned after council chiefs shut down a pier. Colin Jamieson earned his livelihood on Southport Pier which was closed in December last year.
Colin told the Liverpool Echo: “It feels like an apocalypse. It is so empty. It’s not just the void of people. It’s the landscape, as far as the eye can see it is sea and sand. This place is part of my life and I have put all my effort into it along with my family. We have spent £400,000 renovating the café and arcade in the last two years.
Since taking over the lease in 2003, Colin estimates he has invested over £1m in the business. The father-of-two said his income was already dropping when the council stopped the miniature railway operating on the pier - a move Colin believes cut 40 per cent of his revenue. Top news stories today In 1990, the Grade II listed structure narrowly avoided demolition. In 2000, restoration work began, and it reopened to the public in 2002 thanks to work costing £7.2m. Colin said: “It is like a ghost town now and it has been abandoned. I have put a lot of money into this place and it is soul-destroying to see it like this.