Heritage, Pride and Place. Exploring the contribution of World Heritage Site (WHS) status to a  city’s future development

The ICC is working with a range of partners including English Heritage, Liverpool Vision and Liverpool LEP to explore the existing opportunities and challenges for Liverpool to make the most of its WHS designation. The project, led by Dr Beatriz Garcia, builds on the methodologies applied within the Impacts 08 programme to assess the multiple impact of large-scale cultural interventions. The focus will be on an assessment of impact on city image and reputation as well as local citizens’ ‘sense of place. This work will also provide a basis to assess related effects for the city’s tourism economy.

 Our research questions are:

> In which way does the Liverpool’s WHS contribute to the sense of pride of place that local people and communities feel for their city?

> In which way does the Liverpool WHS contribute to Liverpool’s national and international reputation, and how is this creating cultural and economic value for the city?

> What more could be done in the future to capitalise on WHS status?

> What risks are posed by the potential loss of WHS status for the city?

Our consultation methodology includes a wide scale, online public survey; a detailed media content analysis of references to Liverpool as a WHS since its nomination to the present; a range of community focus groups; stakeholder interviews with key business representatives and a final expert workshop. If you are interested in this project please contact Sue Potts – Communications and Relationship Manager -s.potts@ljmu.ac.uk