During the late 20th century, the town went into decline along with other British seaside resorts, but attempts are being made to revitalise the economy.

[3] In the late 18th century, the town was chosen by the physician John Coakley Lettsom as the place in which he would build the Royal Sea Bathing Hospital, which was the first of its kind in Britain.

[4] The Turner Contemporary art gallery occupies a prominent position next to the harbour, and was constructed there with the specific aim of revitalising the town.

In 2021 there was a proposal to convert the unparished area into a civil parish and replace the charter trustees with a town council.

[11] At the 2001 UK census, the economic activity of residents aged 16–74 was 33.8% in full-time employment, 11.8% in part-time employment, 8.0% self-employed, 5.5% unemployed, 2.2% students with jobs, 3.9% students without jobs, 15.5% retired, 8.3% looking after home or family, 7.9% permanently sick or disabled and 3.6% economically inactive for other reasons.

[needs update] Margate railway station is sited 73 miles 69 chains (118.9 km) down the line from London Victoria.

Trains from the station generally run to Victoria, via Chatham, and to London St Pancras, via Ramsgate, Canterbury West and Ashford International on the High Speed 1 line.

Peak hour trains run to St Pancras, via Chatham and Gravesend, and to London Cannon Street.

[13] Most bus services in Margate are operated by Stagecoach South East; with routes linking the town with Canterbury, Herne Bay and Ramsgate and many more.

These services leave every 5-7 minutes (day times) from Cecil Square, in both directions; towards Cliftonville and towards Westwood Cross.

[14] A National Express route, which operates between London Victoria and Ramsgate, calls at Margate seafront, Northdown Park and Cliftonville.

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.

Its Scenic Railway roller coaster is the second oldest of its type in the world, and is now Grade II* Listed.

[22] Margate Museum in Market Place explores the town's seaside heritage in a range of exhibits and displays, and is now opened at weekends by a team of volunteers.

In 1994 Crofts became increasingly determined to create such a gallery and in 1998 the Leader of Kent County Council met a number of people from the art world to discuss the idea.

[27] To reduce the cost, Thanet District Council chose a new site inland from the harbour wall.

In 2012 Margate was chosen as one of the towns to benefit from the Portas Pilot Scheme aimed at regenerating some of Britain's high streets.

It does everything,” Dom Bridges of skincare brand Haeckels, told New Statesman in 2017, adding that many were cropping up in Cliftonville, where locals wouldn't buy.

This was successful, and a civic ceremony celebrated the restoration on 24 May 2014, Queen Victoria's birthday and the 125th anniversary of the Clock Tower's official opening.

This was short lived though and unfortunately, the time ball stopped working again with the pole it is affixed to having been left unrepaired.

T. S. Eliot, who in 1921 recuperated after a mental breakdown in the town of Cliftonville, commented in his poem The Waste Land Part III - The Fire Sermon: Margate features as a destination in Graham Swift's novel Last Orders and its film adaptation.

The Victorian author William Thackeray used out-of-season Margate as the setting for his early unfinished novel A Shabby Genteel Story.

The story related in the song combines the Victorian tradition of the seaside holiday with the works of H. P. Lovecraft, specifically the Cthulhu Mythos, to tell the tale of a Victorian family going on a seaside holiday to Margate, which gets interrupted by Cthulhu rising from the sea.

[40] It is thought that Ralph Vaughan Williams wrote The Lark Ascending whilst walking along the cliffs in Margate.

The song "High Rise" on Hawkwind's 1979 album PXR5 is reported to be inspired by Arlington House, Margate, where lyricist Robert Calvert grew up.

In series 4 of the British television crime drama Peaky Blinders (2017), the character Alfie Solomons (played by Tom Hardy) chooses to reside at Margate, where he's shot on the beach by Tommy Shelby.

In 2021, The Walpole Bay Hotel & Museum is featured in episode 3 of the ITV comedy drama The Larkins.

The event has both quads and solos racing around a specially prepared course on Margate's main sands and it attracts many thousands of visitors.

[57] Local news and television programmes are provided by BBC South East and ITV Meridian.

Oulton, W.C. Picture of Margate, and Its Vicinity [1820] Paternoster Row, London: Baldwin, Cradock, and Joy.