Titanic tourism - opportunity for Belfast, all of Ireland

One hundred years ago today the Titanic eased down the slipway and into the River Lagan in Belfast. For the most of the past 99 years Belfast has ignored or at least played down the Titanic connection thanks to the sense of shame that attached to the ship's sinking.

That is all changing today.

Today Belfast is grasping its Titanic legacy with both hands. The Titanic has morphed from a tragedy into a romantic tragedy over the decades, mostly thanks to Hollywood. That process started long ago, but it's only recently that Belfast has joined in. As the great-grandson of one of Belfast's Titanic workers explained to the Irish Times, the Titanic was "a taboo topic. There was almost a sense of shame that she had been built here."

Even five years ago, when I first went to see the Harland & Wolff shipyard where the Titanic was built, you couldn't actually see much. You weren't allowed to walk yourself around and there were no regular tours. I joined a tour run by enthusiasts who were keen to promote the Titanic ties, but their tour demonstrated clearly that these people were in the minority.

All you could see was ruin: rusted iron gates, garbage dumped all around, shattered glass and broken pavements and the main building, where the plans were drawn was just a big, mostly vacant, lifeless shell. I remember thinking "this is what Belfast thinks of the Titanic."

Just a few years later and all of that is changed. Local museums are devoting exhibition space to the Titanic's artifacts. There are regular, various Titanic Tours and the city sponsors an annual Titanic Festival. Soon the center-piece of Belfast's bid to be the Titanic city - the Titanic Building {photo below} - will offer a great new Titanic-themed visitor experience.

There is competition too. Southampton in England would also like to be the Titanic city. The ship was built in Belfast, but most of the ship's crew lived in Southampton. No city lost more citizens in the disaster. Even Cobh has traditionally made more of its Titanic link than has Belfast. Cobh was the Titanic's last port of call before, the place where Fr. Brown left Titanic after taking his famous set of pictures of the liner.

When you add in all the Irish passengers, the tragic story of Addergoole, Co. Mayo the overall Irish connection to the Titanic is very strong.

Although the Titanic story remains a sad one, all those who survived the sinking and probably all those who lost a loved one are now dead. It's become the distant past.

The ship itself has become a cultural icon and it is that aspect of the Titanic that Belfast is belatedly recognizing has a value in terms of tourist revenues. The real history of why the Titanic sank or the shipyard's unpleasant past hardly matter today when tourism development will help all of Belfast, indeed all of Ireland when the full Irish story is told.

Harland & Wolff still at the cutting edge

Harland & Wolff is a name you will certainly know if you're an aficionado of the Titanic story. However, even if you are only familiar with Belfast you will recognize the two massive yellow cranes that loom over the Harland & Wolff shipyard.

I was in Belfast a few years ago and drove over to East Belfast to see what the Harland & Wolff site looked like. 'Desolate wasteland' sums up pretty much what I saw as I stared through the rusted iron gates. Broken glass, broken concrete, broken dreams were all that was visible.

However, on a later visit I toured the site and two things struck me. First, that although it's a modern day ruin, the dry dock where the Titanic was built is still there as is the building where the plans for the great ship were first drawn.

It didn't take me long to realize that the site had great potential as a tourist attraction. I'm not the only one – there are plans to transform the area from a derelict site into one that tourists will flock to. Whether it's all going to be ready for the 2012 100th anniversary of the Titanic's maiden (& only) voyage is hard to say.

The second thing that caught my eye was a strange red tower just off to the side of the yellow cranes. I knew that H & W were still doing some shipbuilding or repairs, but I knew it was nothing like the old days. However, this red tower was not a ship, but a wave power generator.

As I learned, H & W have diversified into ocean based renewable energy engineering projects. Wave power generators are only part of the project because H & W are also building wind turbines and in July they won a contract to build a tidal turbine, which will produce electricity from the tidal flows.

Harland & Wolff is at the cutting edge of 21st century technology, just as it was at the cutting edge of 20th century technology at the time of the Titanic.

Boston Bruins to play in Belfast

I was reading a report in this morning's Boston Herald about the Bruins' 2-1 over the Rangers last night when this caught my eye: "The plans have not been finalized, but it looks like the first of the two stops on the Bruins’ European excursion in September will be Belfast, Northern Ireland."

The Bruins are going to play in Belfast's Odyssey Arena. The Bruins will be playing a pre-season game against a German club, not the Belfast Giants. Did you know that hockey had found a home in Belfast?

The Giants compete in the UK's Elite Ice Hockey League. They played their first game in 2000 (part of the 2000/2001 season) and were an instant success. They've been at or near the top for most of their existence. The 2009/2010 regular season has just ended and the Giants finished in second, one point behind the team from Coventry. Hopefully they can fix that in the playoffs.

I've never been to a Giants game, but from what I hear the locals have really taken to it. Not just going and enjoying the games, but learning the game. The Bruins should enjoy a fairly knowledgeable crowd in Belfast. It would be great to be there, but I'd probably be the only one rooting against Boston (I'm a Rangers fan and old hatreds die hard).