Our traditional seaside resorts must reinvent themselves to adapt to the 21st century, a leading planning expert has warned.

Dr Samer Bagaeen,  head of the University of Brighton’s planning school, said coastal towns and cities need to reposition themselves to ensure their future prosperity.

The award-winning expert in low-carbon urbanisation and sustainability called for a more inclusive approach from councils to allow residents to be a part of imaginative new solutions for the seafronts.

He was speaking about the sixth point of The Argus’ Seafront 2020 campaign, which encourages private-public partnerships to fund developments and ease the strain on the public purse.

Dr Bagaeen said: “The face of Sussex’s best seaside resorts is changing.

“Towns and cities need to reposition themselves to examine their local spaces and adopt a place-based approach to regeneration that looks beyond individual icons.”

He added: “Something’s obviously being done, slowly, but at least it is being done.

“What’s needed is a more inclusive approach from local councils, an approach that will allow residents to test imaginative and new solutions for the seafront.

“The buildings on our seafronts were iconic buildings of earlier phases of coastal tourism.

“What might their equivalents be for the early 21st century be? Let the residents say what they think.”

Dr Bagaeen cited Thomas Heatherwick’s East Beach Café for inspiring the revival of Littlehampton’s seafront. He said: “Regeneration sometimes starts with a single great building.

“At other times, with great food. And in some instances, it starts with both.”

He also described how Worthing had failed to fulfil its potential as a tourist destination, adding: “Eight years on, Worthing still faces the challenge of how to respond to changes in the leisure and tourist market and how to reinvent itself in the face of increasing competition.”

Meanwhile development consultant Ed Allison-Wright of the Centurion Group said public-private partnerships would be crucial if the region is to live up to its own high expectations.

He said: “What I see as being pivotal to our city fulfilling its potential is the focus on collaborative working.

“Communication is key and the local authority has benefited particularly through the Brighton and Hove Economic Partnership conducting ‘sense-checks’ on strategic projects or plans and to help to neutralise the influence of political infighting.”

Mr Allison-Wright added: “Most of us have seen the dreaded local government ‘graph of doom’ which basically spells out the defeat that the council will be staring at if we don’t group together and get innovative about collaborating.

“This can only be done by joint ventures on development projects and dressing our city as best as we can for ‘inward investment’ and ‘investment from within’ through bold design, reliable infrastructure and commercial solutions.”