A COUPLE of days after Brighton's West Pier collapsed so spectacularly into the sea, I visited Saltburn. The tide was in, forcing hordes of people to stumble along the stoneline while what looked like hundreds more strode along the pier.

The big sea thumped against the pier's spindly legs. A jolt and a shudder shook along its length, but it easily withstood all that the waves could throw at it.

The pier's end is 650ft out and standing there, with the sea foaming beneath the feet, it is remarkable to think that in its prime it was 1,400ft long. It must have stretched way, way into the distance.

It is one of 55 pleasure piers that still protrude from Britain's coast (or 54 after Brighton's collapse on Monday); 36 have been lost, three of them from the North-East, leaving Saltburn the only survivor from the golden age of piers.

That golden age stretched from 1860 to 1914 when railway excursions made it easy to get beside the seaside, and the Factory Acts and the 1871 Bank Holiday Act allowed the working man time off.

Scarborough's was the first pier in the region, built in 1866-69 by legendary pier engineer Eugenius Birch (who also designed Brighton's West Pier) and constructed by Head Wrightson of Stockton - a company that was big in piers.

But it was never profitable, primarily because it was built in the less fashionable North Bay. In fact, the only people to make money out of it were postcard sellers, because within two days of its 1,000ft length being washed away by a storm on January 6, 1905, they had produced cards showing its demise.

As soon as Scarborough had a pier, Saltburn had to compete. It began building its pier in 1868 and opened it in 1870, and within the first six months, more than 50,000 people paid for a promenade along it.

The best example of pier pressure is further north where Redcar - a working-class resort for Teesside folk - got Parliamentary permission to build a pier in 1866. The town didn't become seriously interested in the project until next door Coatham began planning its own in 1870.

For a while the towns contemplated collaboration, but they couldn't agree and so in 1871 Head Wrightson started work on Redcar's solo effort. It cost £6,250 and from its landing stage 1,300ft out to sea, steamers took happy tourists up to Middlesbrough or down to Saltburn and Whitby.

Naturally enough, Coatham demanded a bigger pier, and in 1873 started on a 2,000ft whopper. But it was a jinxed pier, and in one storm in November 1874 two ships were driven through it. So when it opened in 1875, it was just 1,800ft long - shorter than planned but, most importantly, longer than Redcar's.

The jinxed pier, though, didn't last long for in October 1898 a Finnish ship got into trouble 100 miles away off Dogger Bank. It drifted up the north coast, missing Scarborough, Saltburn and Redcar piers before ploughing a 100 yard hole through Coatham pier.

The following year the pier was sold for £250 for scrap.

Redcar, of course, lasted until 1980, but getting shorter and shorter with each passing decade and when it was sold for scrap - also fetching £250 - there was only about 67ft of it left.

Which leaves just Saltburn, resplendent after its recent £1.3m refit, and a pier without peers - at least in the North-East.