Margate
Encyclopedia
Demography
| Margate Compared | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 UK Census | Margate | Thanet | England |
| Population | 57,008 | 126,702 | 49,138,831 |
| Foreign born | 5.8% | 5.1% | 9.2% |
| White | 97% | 98% | 91% |
| Asian | 1.2% | 0.6% | 4.6% |
| Black | 0.5% | 0.3% | 2.3% |
| Christian | 72% | 74% | 72% |
| Muslim | 0.7% | 0.5% | 3.1% |
| Hindu | 0.2% | 0.2% | 1.1% |
| No religion | 17% | 16% | 15% |
| Over 65 years old | 19% | 22% | 16% |
| Under 18 years old | 15% | 21% | 19% |
As of the 2001 UK census
United Kingdom Census 2001
A nationwide census, known as Census 2001, was conducted in the United Kingdom on Sunday, 29 April 2001. This was the 20th UK Census and recorded a resident population of 58,789,194....
, Margate had a population of 40,386.
The ethnicity of the town was 97.1% white
White people
White people is a term which usually refers to human beings characterized, at least in part, by the light pigmentation of their skin...
, 1.0% mixed race, 0.5% black
Black people
The term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...
, 0.8% Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
n, 0.6% Chinese
Chinese people
The term Chinese people may refer to any of the following:*People with Han Chinese ethnicity ....
or other ethnicity.
The place of birth of residents was 94.2% United Kingdom, 0.9% Republic of Ireland
Republic of Ireland
Ireland , described as the Republic of Ireland , is a sovereign state in Europe occupying approximately five-sixths of the island of the same name. Its capital is Dublin. Ireland, which had a population of 4.58 million in 2011, is a constitutional republic governed as a parliamentary democracy,...
, 0.5% Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, 0.8% other Western Europe
Western Europe
Western Europe is a loose term for the collection of countries in the western most region of the European continents, though this definition is context-dependent and carries cultural and political connotations. One definition describes Western Europe as a geographic entity—the region lying in the...
countries, 0.7% Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
, 0.6% Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...
, 0.5% Far East
Far East
The Far East is an English term mostly describing East Asia and Southeast Asia, with South Asia sometimes also included for economic and cultural reasons.The term came into use in European geopolitical discourse in the 19th century,...
, 0.5% South Asia
South Asia
South Asia, also known as Southern Asia, is the southern region of the Asian continent, which comprises the sub-Himalayan countries and, for some authorities , also includes the adjoining countries to the west and the east...
, 0.5% Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
, 0.4% North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
and 0.3% Oceania
Oceania
Oceania is a region centered on the islands of the tropical Pacific Ocean. Conceptions of what constitutes Oceania range from the coral atolls and volcanic islands of the South Pacific to the entire insular region between Asia and the Americas, including Australasia and the Malay Archipelago...
.
Religion was recorded as 71.6% Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
, 0.7% Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
, 0.2% Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
, 0.3% Buddhist, 0.1% Sikh
Sikh
A Sikh is a follower of Sikhism. It primarily originated in the 15th century in the Punjab region of South Asia. The term "Sikh" has its origin in Sanskrit term शिष्य , meaning "disciple, student" or शिक्ष , meaning "instruction"...
and 0.3% Jewish. 17.1% were recorded as having no religion, 0.3% had an alternative religion and 9.8% didn't state their religion.
For every 100 females, there were 92 males. The age distribution was 6% aged 0–4 years, 16% aged 5–15 years, 5% aged 16–19 years, 31% aged 20–44 years, 23% aged 45–64 years and 19% aged 65 years and over.
11% of Margate residents had some kind of higher or professional qualification, compared to the national average of 20%.
Junior and infant
- Palm Bay Primary School
- Drapers Mills Primary School
- Garlinge Primary School
- Cliftonville Primary School
- Holy Trinity and St John's C of E Primary School
- Salmestone Primary School
- St Gregory's Catholic Primary School
- Northdown Primary
Secondary modern
- Hartsdown Technology CollegeHartsdown Technology CollegeHartsdown Technology College is a secondary school in Margate in southeast England, which teaches years 7-14...
- King Ethelbert's School (Birchington)
- Ursuline College (Westgate-On-Sea)
Special
- Farrow House School
- Foreland School
- Laleham Gap School
- St Anthony's School
- Royal School for Deaf Children and Westgate College.
Grammar
- Chatham House Grammar School - Combined into one school in 2011 (Ramsgate)
- Clarenden House Grammar School - Combined into one school in 2011 (Ramsgate)
- Dane Court Grammar School (Broadstairs)
Economy
As of the 2001 UK censusUnited Kingdom Census 2001
A nationwide census, known as Census 2001, was conducted in the United Kingdom on Sunday, 29 April 2001. This was the 20th UK Census and recorded a resident population of 58,789,194....
, the economic activity of residents aged 16–74 was 33.8% in full-time
Full time
Full-time employment is employment in which the employee works the full number of hours defined as such by his/her employer. Full-time employment often comes with benefits that are not typically offered to part-time, temporary, or flexible workers, such as annual leave, sickleave, and health...
employment, 11.8% in part-time
Part time
A part-time job is a form of employment that carries fewer hours per week than a full-time job. Workers are considered to be part time if they commonly work fewer than 30 or 35 hours per week...
employment, 8.0% self-employed, 5.5% unemployed, 2.2% student
Student
A student is a learner, or someone who attends an educational institution. In some nations, the English term is reserved for those who attend university, while a schoolchild under the age of eighteen is called a pupil in English...
s with jobs, 3.9% students without jobs, 15.5% retired, 8.3% looking after home or family
Homemaker
Homemaking is a mainly American term for the management of a home, otherwise known as housework, housekeeping or household management...
, 7.9% permanently sick or disabled and 3.6% economically inactive for other reasons. The rate of unemployment in the town was considerably higher than the national rate of 3.4%.
The industry of employment of residents was 17% retail, 16% health & social work
Social work
Social Work is a professional and academic discipline that seeks to improve the quality of life and wellbeing of an individual, group, or community by intervening through research, policy, community organizing, direct practice, and teaching on behalf of those afflicted with poverty or any real or...
, 13% manufacturing, 9% construction, 8% real estate, 8% education, 7% transport & communications, 5% public administration
Public administration
Public Administration houses the implementation of government policy and an academic discipline that studies this implementation and that prepares civil servants for this work. As a "field of inquiry with a diverse scope" its "fundamental goal.....
, 6% hotels & restaurants, 2% finance, 1% agriculture and 6% other community, social or personal services. Compared to national figures, the town had a relatively high number of workers in the construction, hotels & restaurants and health & social care industries and a relatively low number in real estate and finance.
In more recent years, as tourists have travelled further afield, Margate's unemployment
Unemployment
Unemployment , as defined by the International Labour Organization, occurs when people are without jobs and they have actively sought work within the past four weeks...
rate has become higher than much of the rest of south eastern England.
Margate railway station
Margate railway station
Margate railway station serves the town of Margate in Thanet in Kent, England. Train services are provided by Southeastern.Trains from the station generally run to London Victoria via , or to via Ramsgate, Canterbury West and Ashford International...
, constructed in 1926 to designs by Edwin Maxwell Fry, serves the town. Train services are provided by Southeastern Trains
Southeastern (train operating company)
London & South Eastern Railway Limited, trading as Southeastern is a train operating company in south-east England. On 1 April 2006 it became the franchisee for the new Integrated Kent Franchise , replacing the publicly owned South Eastern Trains on the former South East Franchise...
.
Tourism
For at least 250 years, the town has been a leading seaside resort in the UK, drawing Londoners to its beaches, Margate Sands. The bathing machineBathing machine
The bathing machine was a device, popular in the 18th and 19th centuries, to allow people to change out of their usual clothes, possibly change into swimwear and then wade in the ocean at beaches. Bathing machines were roofed and walled wooden carts rolled into the sea...
s in use at Margate were described in 1805 as
four-wheeled carriages, covered with canvas, and having at one end of them an umbrella of the same materials which is let down to the surface of the water, so that the bather descending from the machine by a few steps is concealed from the public view, whereby the most refined female is enabled to enjoy the advantages of the sea with the strictest delicacy.
Margate faces major structural redevelopments and large inward investment. Its Dreamland
Dreamland Margate
Dreamland Margate is an amusement park located in Margate, Kent, England. It is currently owned by Margate Town Centre Regeneration Company and is closed to the public...
Amusement Park (featured in "The Jolly Boys' Outing
The Jolly Boys' Outing
"The Jolly Boys' Outing" is the eighth Christmas special episode of the BBC sit-com Only Fools and Horses, first screened on 25 December, 1989...
" extended episode of the television series Only Fools and Horses
Only Fools and Horses
Only Fools and Horses is a British sitcom, created and written by John Sullivan. Seven series were originally broadcast on BBC One in the United Kingdom between 1981 and 1991, with sporadic Christmas specials until 2003...
) was threatened with closure because of the increase in value of the site. In 2003, one of the arcades on the seafront was destroyed by fire. This has created a new potential entrance point to the Dreamland site. In the following years, 2004–2006 it was announced that Dreamland (although somewhat reduced in its amusements) would reopen for three months of the summer; a pressure group has been formed to keep it in being. The group is anxious to restore the UK's oldest wooden roller coaster
Roller coaster
The roller coaster is a popular amusement ride developed for amusement parks and modern theme parks. LaMarcus Adna Thompson patented the first coasters on January 20, 1885...
,
The Scenic Railway
The Scenic Railway
The Scenic Railway is a wooden double out-and-back scenic railway located at the site of the former Dreamland Amusement Park, Margate, UK. It was built at the park in 1919/1920 and opened in March 1920. The ride is now almost unique, as a brakeman is still required to travel with the train to...
, which is Grade II Listed and the second oldest in the world, was severely damaged in a fire on 7 April 2008. It was planned that the Dreamland site would reopen as a heritage amusement park in the near future with the Scenic Railway at the centre. Classic rides from the defunct Southport amusement park have already been shipped in as well as parts of the now-demolished water chute at Rhyl
Rhyl
Rhyl is a seaside resort town and community situated on the north east coast of Wales, in the county of Denbighshire , at the mouth of the River Clwyd . To the west is the suburb of Kinmel Bay, with the resort of Towyn further west, Prestatyn to the east and Rhuddlan to the south...
. More details on Dreamland's future can be obtained from the Dreamland Trust website. Today the Dreamland roller coaster is one of only two early-20th century scenic railways still remaining in the UK; the only other surviving UK scenic railway is located in Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach
Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach is a historic free entry pleasure park located in the seaside resort town of Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, on the English east coast. The park first opened in 1909 and has been operating ever since....
and was built in 1932. If the Dreamland Scenic Railway is not rescued, the Great Yarmouth coaster will become the last of its kind in the country. The Margate roller coaster is an ACE
American Coaster Enthusiasts
The American Coaster Enthusiasts is an organization dedicated to the enjoyment and preservation of roller coasters. Membership is open to anyone with payment of yearly dues, and membership benefits may include discounted admission to certain amusement parks...
Coaster Classic.
Cliftonville
Cliftonville
Cliftonville is a coastal area of the town of Margate, situated to the east of the main town, in the Thanet district of Kent, South East England, United Kingdom. It also contains the area known as Palm Bay....
, next to Margate, has a classic British Arnold Palmer
Arnold Palmer
Arnold Daniel Palmer is an American professional golfer, who is generally regarded as one of the greatest players in the history of men's professional golf. He has won numerous events on both the PGA Tour and Champions Tour, dating back to 1955...
seaside mini golf course.
The Turner Contemporary art gallery occupies a prominent position next to the harbour.
There are two notable theatres, the Theatre Royal in Addington Street - the second oldest theatre in the country - and the Tom Thumb
Tom Thumb
Tom Thumb is a character of English folklore. The History of Tom Thumb was published in 1621, and has the distinction of being the first fairy tale printed in English. Tom is no bigger than his father's thumb, and his adventures include being swallowed by a cow, tangling with giants, and becoming a...
Theatre, the second smallest in the country, in addition to the Winter Gardens. The Theatre Royal was built in 1787, burned down in 1829 and was remodelled in 1879 giving Margate more national publicity. The exterior is largely from the l9th century. From 1885 to 1899 actor-manager
Actor-manager
An actor-manager is a leading actor who sets up their own permanent theatrical company and manages the company's business and financial arrangements, sometimes taking over the management of a theatre, to perform plays of their own choice and in which they will usually star...
Sarah Thorne
Sarah Thorne
Sarah Thorne was a British actress and actor-manager of the nineteenth century who managed the Theatre Royal at Margate for many years and who ran a School for Acting there widely regarded as Britain's first formal drama school...
ran a School for Acting at the Theatre Royal which is widely regarded as Britain's first formal drama school. Actors who received their initial theatrical training there include Harley Granville-Barker
Harley Granville-Barker
Harley Granville-Barker was an English actor-manager, director, producer, critic and playwright....
, Evelyn Millard
Evelyn Millard
Evelyn Mary Millard was an English Shakespearean actress, actor-manager and "stage beauty" of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries perhaps best known for creating the role of Cecily Cardew in the 1895 premiere of Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest.-Early life and...
, Louis Calvert
Louis Calvert
Louis James Calvert was a British stage and early film actor of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and an actor-manager...
, George Thorne
George Thorne
George Thorne, was an English singer and actor, best known for his performances in the comic baritone roles of the Savoy Operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, especially on tour and in the original New York City productions...
, Janet Achurch
Janet Achurch
Janet Achurch was an English stage actress and actor-manager. She made her London debut in 1883. She played many Shakespearean roles, but is best known as a pioneer of major roles in the works of Ibsen. Perhaps her most notable role was as Nora in A Doll's House...
, Adelaide Neilson
Adelaide Neilson
Lilian Adelaide Neilson , born Elizabeth Ann Brown, was an English stage actress.-Early life:Neilson was the daughter of a strolling actress, named Brown, and was born, out of wedlock, at 35 St Peters Square Leeds in the West Riding of Yorkshire...
and Irene
Irene Vanbrugh
Dame Irene Vanbrugh DBE , née Barnes, was an English actress. The daughter of a clergyman, Vanbrugh followed her elder sister Violet into the theatrical profession, and sustained a career for more than 50 years....
and Violet Vanbrugh
Violet Vanbrugh
Violet Vanbrugh was an English actress who had a career spanning more than 50 years. Despite her many successes, her career was overshadowed by that of her more famous sister Irene Vanbrugh...
, among others.
An annual jazz festival takes place on a weekend in July.
First discovered in 1798, the Margate Caves (also known as the Vortigern Caves) are situated at the bottom of Northdown Road. They are currently closed to the public.
The Shell Grotto
Shell Grotto, Margate
The Shell Grotto is an ornate subterranean passageway in Margate, Kent. Almost all the surface area of the walls and roof is covered in mosaics created entirely of seashells, totalling about of mosaic, or 4.6 million shells. It was discovered in 1835 but its age remains unknown...
, which has walls and roof covered in elaborate decorations of over four million shells covering 2000 square feet (185.8 m²) in complex patterns, was rediscovered in 1835, but is of unknown age and origin. It has been designated as a Grade I listed building.
There is a 16th century 2-storey timber-framed Tudor
Tudor style architecture
The Tudor architectural style is the final development of medieval architecture during the Tudor period and even beyond, for conservative college patrons...
house built on a flint plinth in King Street.
Regeneration
The former chairman of the Margate Civic Society, John Crofts, had a plan to develop a centre that would explore and show the link that the painter JMW Turner shared with Margate. In 1994 he became increasingly determined to create such a gallery and in 1998 the Leader of Kent County CouncilKent County Council
Kent County Council is the county council that governs the majority of the county of Kent in England. It provides the upper tier of local government, below which are 12 district councils, and around 300 town and parish councils. The county council has 84 elected councillors...
met a number of people from the art world to discuss the idea. They hoped that the centre would regenerate the once-thriving town of Margate and offer an alternative to Margate's traditional tourist trade. In the late 1990s, the County Council offered to fund the building of the Turner Gallery. Additional funding was contributed by the Arts Council England
Arts Council England
Arts Council England was formed in 1994 when the Arts Council of Great Britain was divided into three separate bodies for England, Scotland and Wales. It is a non-departmental public body of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport...
and South East England Development Agency
South East England Development Agency
SEEDA, more officially the South East England Development Agency, is one of a number of regional development agencies in England. It was set up as a non-departmental public body in 1999 to promote the region and to enable a number of more difficult regeneration projects which otherwise might not...
. In 2001 the Turner Contemporary was officially established. The site initially proposed formed part of the harbour itself, but some critics questioned the prudence of placing part of Britain's national art treasures in a spot that was exposed to the full fury of the North Sea
North Sea
In the southwest, beyond the Straits of Dover, the North Sea becomes the English Channel connecting to the Atlantic Ocean. In the east, it connects to the Baltic Sea via the Skagerrak and Kattegat, narrow straits that separate Denmark from Norway and Sweden respectively...
. To reduce the cost, Thanet District Council
Thanet District Council
Thanet District Council is the local government body for the Thanet district. Its administrative centre is Margate. It is one of the district councils in Kent...
chose a new site inland from the harbour wall. The scheme was supported by the artist Tracey Emin
Tracey Emin
Tracey Karima Emin RA is a British artist of English and Turkish Cypriot origin. She is part of the group known as Britartists or YBAs ....
, who was brought up in Margate. The building itself was designed by David Chipperfield Architects after the abandonment of the design by Snøhetta + Spence architects. Building work started in 2008 but the project's initiator, John Crofts, died in 2009. The Turner Contemporary Gallery officially opened on the 16th April 2011. It is hoped the gallery will help regenerate the town in the same way St Ives
St Ives, Cornwall
St Ives is a seaside town, civil parish and port in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The town lies north of Penzance and west of Camborne on the coast of the Celtic Sea. In former times it was commercially dependent on fishing. The decline in fishing, however, caused a shift in commercial...
has benefited from the introduction of the Tate Gallery
Tate Gallery
The Tate is an institution that houses the United Kingdom's national collection of British Art, and International Modern and Contemporary Art...
.
Near the gallery is a thriving community of independent shops in an area known as The Old Town, centered around the Old Town Hall and Market Place. Local entrepreneurs here are aiding the regeneration by giving visitors an ever-expanding range of shops to browse and buy in, and an equal variety of places in which to eat and drink.
Cultural references
Margate features as a destination in Graham SwiftGraham Swift
Graham Colin Swift FRSL is a British author. He was born in London, England and educated at Dulwich College, London, Queens' College, Cambridge, and later the University of York. He was a friend of Ted Hughes...
's novel Last Orders
Last Orders
Last Orders is a 1996 Booker Prize-winning novel by British author Graham Swift. In 2001 it was adapted for the film Last Orders by Australian writer and director Fred Schepisi.-Plot summary:...
and the film version of it. Jack Dodds has asked to have his remains scattered at Margate. The book tells the tale of the drive to Margate and the memories evoked on the way. It also features at the start and as a recurrent theme in Iain Aitch
Iain Aitch
Iain Aitch is an English writer and journalist who was born in Margate and who now lives in London. He is the author of the travel book A Fete Worse Than Death, which is a humorous first person journey through an English summer. He is also author of We're British, Innit, which is a humorous lexicon...
's travelogue A Fete Worse Than Death
A Fete Worse Than Death
A Fête Worse Than Death: A Journey through an English Summer is a travel book by Iain Aitch. It was written in the summer of 2002 when the author took a trip around England to see what made the English act so strangely in the summer....
. The author was born in the town.
T. S. Eliot
T. S. Eliot
Thomas Stearns "T. S." Eliot OM was a playwright, literary critic, and arguably the most important English-language poet of the 20th century. Although he was born an American he moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 and was naturalised as a British subject in 1927 at age 39.The poem that made his...
, who recuperated after a mental breakdown in the suburb of Cliftonville
Cliftonville
Cliftonville is a coastal area of the town of Margate, situated to the east of the main town, in the Thanet district of Kent, South East England, United Kingdom. It also contains the area known as Palm Bay....
in 1921, commented in his poem The Waste Land Part III - The Fire Sermon
The Waste Land
The Waste Land[A] is a 434-line[B] modernist poem by T. S. Eliot published in 1922. It has been called "one of the most important poems of the 20th century." Despite the poem's obscurity—its shifts between satire and prophecy, its abrupt and unannounced changes of speaker, location and time, its...
:
- On Margate sands.
- I can connect
- Nothing with nothing.
Draper's Mill, Margate
Draper's Mill or Old Mill is a Grade II listed Smock mill in Margate, Kent, England that was built circa 1847.-History:Draper's mill was built in 1845 by John Holman, the Canterbury millwright, replacing an earlier mill that had previously been moved here from Nayland Point...
is a smock mill
Smock mill
The smock mill is a type of windmill that consists of a sloping, horizontally weatherboarded tower, usually with six or eight sides. It is topped with a roof or cap that rotates to bring the sails into the wind...
built in 1845 by John Holman. It was working by wind until 1916 and by engine until the late 1930s. It was saved from demolition and is now restored and open to the public.
The town appeared on BBC TV's The Apprentice in May 2009.
The town was the title of a minor UK hit by Chas & Dave in 1982.
Margate, most notably the railway station
Margate railway station
Margate railway station serves the town of Margate in Thanet in Kent, England. Train services are provided by Southeastern.Trains from the station generally run to London Victoria via , or to via Ramsgate, Canterbury West and Ashford International...
and Dreamland
Dreamland Margate
Dreamland Margate is an amusement park located in Margate, Kent, England. It is currently owned by Margate Town Centre Regeneration Company and is closed to the public...
, featured prominently in the 1989 Only Fools & Horses episode 'The Jolly Boys' Outing'.
Margate F'Targan is a song written by The Men That Will Not Be Blamed For Nothing
The Men That Will Not Be Blamed for Nothing
The Men That Will Not be Blamed for Nothing are a steampunk band from London. Their name is a reference to the chalked graffiti discovered above a section of blood-stained apron thought to have been discarded by Jack the Ripper as he fled the scene of Catherine Eddowes' murder...
, a UK based Steampunk
Steampunk
Steampunk is a sub-genre of science fiction, fantasy, alternate history, and speculative fiction that came into prominence during the 1980s and early 1990s. Steampunk involves a setting where steam power is still widely used—usually Victorian era Britain or "Wild West"-era United...
band. The song celebrates the Victorian heritage of visiting the seaside in the 19th century. It will feature on the as yet untitled second album.
Sport
- Margate Boxing Club.
- Margate Yacht Club.
- Margate F.C.Margate F.C.Margate Football Club is an English football team based in the seaside resort of Margate, Kent, currently playing in the Isthmian League Premier Division. The club was known for a number of years during the 1980s as Thanet United....
play at Hartsdown ParkHartsdown ParkHartsdown Park is a football stadium located in Margate, Kent, England. It has been the home of Margate F.C. since 1929, apart from between 2002 and 2005, when the club was forced to share the grounds of other Kent clubs while protracted redevelopment work occurred.Although the football club was...
. The club has played in the Conference NationalConference NationalConference National is the top division of the Football Conference in England. It is the highest level of the National League System and fifth highest of the overall English football league system...
, but they are currently aiming to gain promotion out of the Isthmian League Premier Division. - National beach volleyballBeach volleyballBeach volleyball, or sand volleyball, is an Olympic team sport played by two teams of two players on a sand court divided by a net.Like volleyball, the object of the game is to send the ball over the net in order to ground it on the opponent’s court, and to prevent the same effort by the opponent....
competitions are often held on the main sands. - The Margate Big Sky Beach Race, run on the beach at Margate, had its 5th event on 6 and 7 March 2010 and attracts a number of the UK's top quad riders and racers as well as some from overseas. Spectating is free and usually attracts thousands of visitors over the weekend. The event is run by the QRA UK.
Local media
Margate has two paid-for newspapers, the Isle of Thanet Gazette and Thanet Times (which is now delivered free to some areas), which are owned by Northcliffe MediaNorthcliffe Media
Northcliffe Media Ltd. is a large regional newspaper publisher in the UK and Central and Eastern Europe, owned by the Daily Mail and General Trust. The company's name was changed to Northcliffe Media from Northcliffe Newspaper Group in 2007.It operates from over 30 publishing centres, and also...
. Free newspapers for the town include the Thanet Extra, part of the KM Group
KM Group
The KM Group, formerly known as the Kent Messenger Group until 2008, is a multimedia company based in the county of Kent in South East England...
; and yourthanet, part of KOS Media
KOS Media
KOS Media is a multimedia company based in the county of Kent in South East England. The company operates local newspapers and internet sites throughout the county.-History:...
. Local radio stations are KMFM Thanet
KMFM Thanet
KMFM Thanet is an Independent Local Radio serving the Isle of Thanet and the surrounding areas in Kent, South East England. It is part of the KMFM group of radio stations in the county, which are part of the KM Group.-History:...
, owned by the KM Group, community radio
Community radio
Community radio is a type of radio service, that offers a third model of radio broadcasting beyond commercial broadcasting and public broadcasting. Community stations can serve geographic communities and communities of interest...
station Academy FM (Thanet)
Academy FM (Thanet)
107.8 Academy FM is a non commercial community 24 hour local radio station based in Ramsgate, Kent and serving the Isle of Thanet. It launched on 5 April 2010, Easter Monday.107.8 Academy FM is based within The Marlowe Academy,Ramsgate...
; and the county-wide stations Heart Kent, Gold and BBC Radio Kent
BBC Radio Kent
BBC Radio Kent is the BBC Local Radio service for the English county of Kent.It broadcasts on FM on 96.7 , 97.6 and 104.2 also 774 and 1602 MW and DAB.- History :The radio station was launched in 1970 under the name of BBC Radio Medway, originally only serving the...
.Thanet Community Radio also offer a online community podcasting service for Ramsgate, Broadstairs, Margate and the wider areas of Thanet.
Twin towns
Margate is twinnedTown twinning
Twin towns and sister cities are two of many terms used to describe the cooperative agreements between towns, cities, and even counties in geographically and politically distinct areas to promote cultural and commercial ties.- Terminology :...
with the following towns/cities: Larnaca, Cyprus
Larnaca
Larnaca, is the third largest city on the southern coast of Cyprus after Nicosia and Limassol. It has a population of 72,000 and is the island's second largest commercial port and an important tourist resort...
Idar-Oberstein, Germany
Idar-Oberstein
Idar-Oberstein is a town in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. As a Große kreisangehörige Stadt , it assumes some of the responsibilities that for smaller municipalities in the district are assumed by the district administration...
Yalta, Ukraine
Yalta
Yalta is a city in Crimea, southern Ukraine, on the north coast of the Black Sea.The city is located on the site of an ancient Greek colony, said to have been founded by Greek sailors who were looking for a safe shore on which to land. It is situated on a deep bay facing south towards the Black...