Liverpool's reign as European Capital of Culture may have come to an end early last month, but as the publicity says, it is only "the end of the beginning". And it has to be if Liverpool is to sustain the success that a series of festivals, partnerships and investments have brought to the city.
It is widely accepted that Liverpool '08 was a success. David Fleming, director of National Museums Liverpool (NML), said he was looking for two outcomes from the year - an increase in the use of museums by local people and the end of Liverpool's image as a rough and unsafe city. He believes the city has been successful on both counts - though the latter is harder to measure.
NML's visitor figures have risen by 36 per cent. Merseyside Maritime Museum received more than a million visitors during the year - an increase of 69 per cent on 2007. Only one NML gallery, the Lady Lever on the Wirral, experienced a fall - of 15.9 per cent.
Impacts '08 is a five-year research project, set up in 2005, to assess the economic, social and cultural results of the year. Its preliminary findings show that visibility in the media has had a large effect on the public perception of the city.
The research team studied media coverage since 2000 and found a concentration on football and crime. Since the city's nomination was announced, Impact '08 found culture coverage had increased fourfold.
After its term as European City of Culture (as it was called then) in 1990, Glasgow enjoyed a boost to its image and tourism economy. Similarly, the economic benefit to Liverpool was an estimated £800m.
But while the city area may have flourished, thanks to the 15 million cultural visits to its 7,000 events during the year, which included the art biennial and street festivals, there is always the risk that the success may not have spread to smaller institutions and the wider region.
One museum in a neighbouring borough bemoaned the fact that although it was told by the Mersey Partnership that it would benefit from Liverpool '08, the museum was not promoted as part of the cultural year - and in fact lost visitors.
Beatriz Garcia, the director of Impacts '08, said media coverage had concentrated on the large events, and although there were creative community partnerships in the Liverpool regions, such as artists working around the difficult issues of youth crime and alcohol abuse, Impacts' surveys in neighbourhoods showed participants didn't associate it with the Capital of Culture year.
Garcia argues that the programmes that really "touched people" were not promoted or presented as part of the cultural year. After 1990, Glasgow grabbed every opportunity to maintain the momentum, says Liz Cameron, chairwoman of Culture and Sport Glasgow. New ways of working were key and festivals were started.
The city also applied for the Year of Visual Arts in 1996, and despite failing, it drew on its famous architecture with a retrospective of Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The Lighthouse centre for architecture then opened and in 1999 Glasgow was designated UK City of Architecture and Design.
Liverpool is continuing the themed programme, with this year dubbed Year of the Environment and 2010 the Year of Innovation. In the same way as Glasgow, the city will no doubt experience a drop-off in its cultural visitor figures, and there is unlikely to be new money around to boost them.
But it will probably be five-to 10-years before there can be a real understanding of whether the city's cultural and economic regeneration has been sustained.
It is widely accepted that Liverpool '08 was a success. David Fleming, director of National Museums Liverpool (NML), said he was looking for two outcomes from the year - an increase in the use of museums by local people and the end of Liverpool's image as a rough and unsafe city. He believes the city has been successful on both counts - though the latter is harder to measure.
NML's visitor figures have risen by 36 per cent. Merseyside Maritime Museum received more than a million visitors during the year - an increase of 69 per cent on 2007. Only one NML gallery, the Lady Lever on the Wirral, experienced a fall - of 15.9 per cent.
Impacts '08 is a five-year research project, set up in 2005, to assess the economic, social and cultural results of the year. Its preliminary findings show that visibility in the media has had a large effect on the public perception of the city.
The research team studied media coverage since 2000 and found a concentration on football and crime. Since the city's nomination was announced, Impact '08 found culture coverage had increased fourfold.
After its term as European City of Culture (as it was called then) in 1990, Glasgow enjoyed a boost to its image and tourism economy. Similarly, the economic benefit to Liverpool was an estimated £800m.
But while the city area may have flourished, thanks to the 15 million cultural visits to its 7,000 events during the year, which included the art biennial and street festivals, there is always the risk that the success may not have spread to smaller institutions and the wider region.
One museum in a neighbouring borough bemoaned the fact that although it was told by the Mersey Partnership that it would benefit from Liverpool '08, the museum was not promoted as part of the cultural year - and in fact lost visitors.
Beatriz Garcia, the director of Impacts '08, said media coverage had concentrated on the large events, and although there were creative community partnerships in the Liverpool regions, such as artists working around the difficult issues of youth crime and alcohol abuse, Impacts' surveys in neighbourhoods showed participants didn't associate it with the Capital of Culture year.
Garcia argues that the programmes that really "touched people" were not promoted or presented as part of the cultural year. After 1990, Glasgow grabbed every opportunity to maintain the momentum, says Liz Cameron, chairwoman of Culture and Sport Glasgow. New ways of working were key and festivals were started.
The city also applied for the Year of Visual Arts in 1996, and despite failing, it drew on its famous architecture with a retrospective of Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The Lighthouse centre for architecture then opened and in 1999 Glasgow was designated UK City of Architecture and Design.
Liverpool is continuing the themed programme, with this year dubbed Year of the Environment and 2010 the Year of Innovation. In the same way as Glasgow, the city will no doubt experience a drop-off in its cultural visitor figures, and there is unlikely to be new money around to boost them.
But it will probably be five-to 10-years before there can be a real understanding of whether the city's cultural and economic regeneration has been sustained.
Links
Impacts '08 publishes its research online at www.impacts08.net
Impacts '08 publishes its research online at www.impacts08.net
