While spectacular seafront developments in Brighton proposed by the private sector seem to have stalled, no such problems are affecting higher education.

Sussex University plans to spend £220 million over the next five years on expanding and enhancing the main campus at Falmer.

Brighton University has announced extensive plans for developing several sites in the city centre which will also revitalise run down areas.

And not to be outdone, City College is to spend more than £73 million on transforming its run-down campus at Pelham Street.

The founding of Sussex University was the single most significant development in Brighton since the Second World War.

As one of the first red brick universities, Sussex brought a new look to higher education, combining freedom of expression with academic rigour.

It also encouraged the expansion of Brighton University whose main arts and technology colleges had actually been around for far longer.

The two universities are among the city’s top five employers with thousands of staff. The total number of students at peak times, including those at foreign language colleges, must be approaching 100,000.

These students have transformed Brighton, which was in danger of becoming old and rickety, into a dynamic city full of ideas and enterprise.

A look at the list of celebrated graduates from the universities includes many who have made their mark in science, literature and the arts.

Creative

Others such as Steve Bassam, Ian Duncan and Mick Johnson played leading roles as members of the borough council as it slowly swung from Tory to Labour.

There is little doubt that student voters helped Kemp Town elect the first Labour MP in Sussex almost half a century ago, or that in 2010 they persuaded Brighton to choose the nation’s first Green MP.

Many former arts students have since settled in Brighton and have boosted the creative industries so that they have become a significant sector of Brighton’s economy.

They have also helped Brighton become one of Britain’s leading cities for music – it is reputed to be home to 500 bands.

The two universities have combined on many major projects. Perhaps the most important and successful has been the medical school.

It’s also worth remembering that without their help, Brighton and Hove Albion would not have been able to build the Amex community stadium at Falmer.

There is also a downside. Whole districts on either side of the Lewes Road have been crammed with students, which can create problems with existing neighbours.

They are also squeezing native Brightonians out of homes that would have been theirs and forcing many of them to flee from the city.

Disgraceful

Unscrupulous landlords have also made the most from students. I was shocked when I saw two terraced houses occupied by my niece and her friends while they were studying at Sussex.

They were in a disgraceful condition.

Both universities have tried to tackle the problem by building homes on campus sites and in the city. But it remains a big difficulty.

There is much more that they can contribute in the years ahead.

I hope it will include fine modern architecture.

I do not like Sir Basil Spence’s original buildings for Sussex University at Falmer, but appear to be in a minority of one since they are Grade 1 listed.

However there is little doubt that a lot of the subsequent development at Falmer has been below standard.

Some people like borough architect Percy Billington’s art college design for Brighton in the Sixties, although it leaves me cold. Much better is the Brighton University library at Moulsecoomb.

There are real opportunities for exciting buildings at Falmer, Pelham Street and Kemp Town in the near future.

Brighton was bold in welcoming a university in the Sixties. Anyone who doubts that has only to look at towns which came late to academic life such as Bognor Regus and Hastings to see how deprived they are by comparison.

There will be troubles ahead for the universities from financial squeezes and from some students opposed to what they regard as creeping privatisation.

But academia right now is seeing surging success denied to many other sectors of the city.