A Walk on the Wild Side – Blackpool’s Community Media on YouTube

14/04/2025 Rob Watson Community Media 0

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Stephen Cheatley is a Blackpool-based content creator whose YouTube channel A Walk on the Wild Side offers viewers an immersive stroll through the seaside town’s streets. In each video, Cheatley films as he walks around Blackpool, providing friendly commentary with a dash of humour and local insight. His style is informal and authentic – more a personal guided tour than a polished tourism promo.

Cheatley showcases all sides of Blackpool, from its famous Golden Mile and promenade to its tucked-away back streets and run-down corners. One day he might take viewers through the bustling pubs and clubs on a Saturday night, while another day he’ll venture down a quiet street or even the “official red light area” to show what’s really there. This candid approach means his videos depict Blackpool’s reality, not just the postcard image, and often introduce the various characters he meets along the way.

Cheatley’s purpose is both to inform and entertain. As an award-winning photographer in travel and astronomy, he brings a keen eye for visuals, but his vlogs are less about fancy cinematography and more about storytelling. He started the channel during the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020 as a way to share updates and interesting sights in a difficult time. Since then, it has grown into a vibrant chronicle of local life, with new videos posted several times a week.

His content often taps into local nostalgia and current events – for example, highlighting a nearly deserted promenade in winter to illustrate Blackpool’s off-season lull. In one tongue-in-cheek video, he jokingly urged tourists to “stay away” from Blackpool during the quiet months (even suggesting they visit a neighbouring town instead) to give the resort a breather. While some casual viewers misunderstood the sarcasm, Cheatley’s regular audience “know [his] sense of humour” and understood it as a playful comment on the seasonal economy. This episode sparked debate in the comments about Blackpool’s dependence on tourism, showing how his storytelling can engage local narratives and prompt discussion among viewers.

An Independent YouTube Channel as Community Media

Even though A Walk on the Wild Side is an independent, one-man production, it functions as a form of community media for Blackpool. Community media refers to media created by community members themselves (outside of corporate or state control) to serve local audiences and interests. Cheatley’s channel exemplifies this: it is by a Blackpool local, for people who care about Blackpool.

The videos aren’t just personal vlogs; they double as grassroots reportage on the town – what one might call “community reporting”. When Cheatley walks down a street with his camera, he documents the state of the locale, be it a new attraction on the seafront or boarded-up shops on a side road. These on-the-ground updates and observations resonate with residents and fans of the town, creating an informal record of Blackpool’s day-to-day happenings.

Importantly, Cheatley’s work is part of a growing trend in place-based video blogging. Across the UK and internationally, many individuals have begun using platforms like YouTube to showcase their own communities. Advances in technology – from affordable high-quality cameras to ubiquitous streaming platforms – have made it easier for local enthusiasts to become broadcasters of their streets and cities.

Media researchers note that these kinds of YouTube walking tours “focus on the link with places and the localised identities” of those places. In contrast to slick travel videos made by visitors, channels like Cheatley’s are created by people with a deep affinity for their hometown, giving viewers an insider’s perspective.

For example, in St Helens (Merseyside), a vlogger known as Exploring with JB similarly films walks through his town centre to share its story. In London, local video guides explore neighbourhood histories, and in New York City, a creator like ActionKid offers daily street-level tours of boroughs with a native New Yorker’s eye. All these producers, like Cheatley, engage in community-rooted video storytelling: they spotlight the everyday scenes, concerns, and charms of places they know intimately.

Shaping Civic Discourse and Place Representation

The rise of channels like A Walk on the Wild Side has meaningful implications for civic discourse and how places are publicly represented. Through his videos, Stephen Cheatley has become a chronicler and ambassador of Blackpool in the digital space.

By covering everything from lively summer crowds to the quiet out-of-season months, his content paints a fuller picture of Blackpool than one might get from official sources alone. This unvarnished portrayal can stimulate community conversation about local issues.

For instance, when Cheatley highlighted the emptiness of the winter promenade, it sparked discussions about Blackpool’s economic reliance on seasonal tourism. Viewers debated the merits of encouraging tourists year-round versus giving the town a rest – effectively a public dialogue about the town’s identity and strategy, initiated by a YouTube video.

Moreover, the engagement around his channel suggests that such independent media can bolster civic pride and interest. Many locals appreciate seeing their town represented honestly yet affectionately. One viewer famously commented that “there is no greater ambassador for all things Blackpool… than Stephen”.

This sentiment reflects how his authentic coverage has earned trust. In fact, Cheatley’s popularity and credibility are such that “officials and business owners [are] falling over themselves to work with” him. In other words, the local establishment recognises his influence in shaping Blackpool’s public image.

Relevance to Community Development and Local Communications

For community media practitioners and public sector communications managers, the success of A Walk on the Wild Side underscores the growing importance of grassroots media in community development and local democracy. These independent, place-focused video blogs offer authentic engagement with the public. They build an audience not through official mandate but through relatable content and genuine passion for the locale.

In doing so, they can strengthen community bonds – viewers often share memories or feedback in the comments, creating a dialogue around local heritage, problems, and hopes. This kind of bottom-up communication can complement more formal channels. For example, a council’s regeneration project might get dry coverage in a press release, but a local vlogger filming the changed street landscape can humanise the story and draw in a wider public interest.

Crucially, community-rooted channels like Cheatley’s also serve a democratic function. They lower the barrier to media participation, allowing voices from outside the halls of government or big media to shape the conversation about a place. This pluralism is healthy for democracy – it means the public hears a diversity of perspectives.

For local authorities and civic organisations, engaging with this genre of media offers an opportunity to listen and respond to grassroots concerns. It can inform better decision-making and ensure that official messaging resonates. Of course, working with independent creators requires respect for their independent voice; the appeal of A Walk on the Wild Side is exactly that it isn’t an official mouthpiece, but a genuine community viewpoint.

Nonetheless, by understanding and appreciating such work, community leaders can harness its positive impact – from boosting local pride and tourism interest, to identifying issues that matter to residents. In Blackpool’s case, Stephen Cheatley’s videos have become part of the town’s story. They illustrate how an individual with a camera and a love of place can contribute to community development and civic representation, one walkabout video at a time.

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