Is this really what our city needs?

Surveying the Solent from the top of Ports-mouth's Spinnaker Tower, Southampton's famous buildings appear clustered in a model village.

The horizon is also punctuated by the Fawley towers, symbolising the industrial past and present of the port city.

But Portsmouth's new landmark arguably represents something quite different. To the city's leaders, the Spinnaker Tower epitomises everything they insist 21st century Portsmouth is about - confidence, status and faith in a prosperous future.

On the face of it the 170-metre structure appears to promise Portsmouth everything Southampton is looking for - the elusive WOW factor.

Yet the creation of iconic symbolism has a chequered history. Many equivalent landmarks - including the Millennium Dome and the Angel of the North - have been tarnished with controversy and the Spinnaker is no exception.

As Portsmouth's image-makers celebrate the creation of a marketing dream, there remains the small matter of Spinnaker's £35m price tag, much of the bill footed by the taxpayer. Not to mention the senior council heads that rolled in the process.

And while the rhetoric talks of the building itself magically spreading confidence, history will judge whether the tower, an astonishing five-and-half-years overdue, was worth the financial risk.

The Spinnaker, scheduled for opening in May, today looks down on the harbour with almost a sense of arrogance.

It is the biggest, tallest, boldest statement of intent on the South Coast and Portsmouth is unashamedly revelling in the attention.

Yet Southampton's leaders - now looking to generate the city's own WOW factor - stand by their decision not to have pursued a similarly dramatic icon.

Both Portsmouth and Southampton stood at the same crossroads in the mid-nineties as they confronted the same regeneration headache.

Like Southampton, Portsmouth was a city shaped post-war.

The Blitz ensured a sudden demand for quick fix affordable housing with aesthetic quality taking a backseat to packing 'em in.

Its image was rough and ready - a holiday destination of choice it was not.

By the start of the nineties, Portsmouth was marketing itself on its maritime heritage - HMS Victory, Warrior and the legacy of the Mary Rose provided the city with a satisfactory source of revenue from the region's educational establishments if not tourists.

But while the past was more than catered for, a vision for the future was clearly lacking. At a time when the nation was obsessed with millennial post-modernism, Portsmouth was barely modern.

The establishment of the Millennium Commission in 1993 saw a pot of National Lottery money made available to fund projects deemed fitting to herald the arrival of the year 2000.

But while Portsmouth were intent on making a grand statement, Southampton opted to take a much more low key approach to welcoming the new millennium.

As far as Portsmouth City Council were concerned, the lottery money presented an opportunity too good to miss - the city needed a new identity and now there was the cash to shape it.

The site of the old HMS Vernon was primed for redevelopment and plans for the £90m Renaissance of Portsmouth Harbour, incorporating Gunwharf Quays and customised Millennium promenades, drafted.

The landmark tower was considered the jewel in the crown.

Sitting in his office, with the Spinnaker rising symbolically over the roofs in the distance, Roger Ching, Director for Economy, Culture and Community Safety explains.

"I've always said to my members and critics of the scheme, who questioned why we built a tower and didn't put the money into hospitals or schools, that if the money hadn't come to us it would've gone to Southampton, or Brighton or Plymouth for example.

"The harbour's such a fantastic asset but the public previously had no access to it. Everyone when they're abroad migrates to the water's edge to see what's going on and now we have a facility that attracts people to do that here."

He does concede however that the enthusiasm local people to the original plans may have been different if they knew then that the council would be contributing £10m of their money to the scheme.

And 30 miles down the coast Southampton City Council, Councillor June Bridle has no regrets that Southampton chose not to bid for a similar lavish landmark scheme.

Cllr Bridle, the then leader of the council, said preference was given to a number of small-scale projects funded by lottery cash such as a World War memorial garden in Woolston and youth projects.

She said: "We believed a large scale project was not deliverable at the time and looking at Portsmouth's experience, and considering how much their tower cost, I think we were right not to do so."

Present council leader Adrian Vinson agreed Portsmouth's Spinnaker had cost too much. He said: "I favour bidding for things that will benefit the city and its citizens. I don't favour bidding for things that are grandiose statements."

It doesn't matter where you are in Portsmouth, the Spinnaker Tower - the design favoured by 60 per cent of residents who took advantage of their chance to vote - has a habit of making itself known to you.

It creeps between houses, rises at the end of streets and appears in reflections in window. You may not always be able to see it but it is omnipresent.

As it stands proudly at the entrance of the harbour, acting as a welcome to all ships, boats and seafarers returning to port, the tower forms an unconscious divide between Portsmouth now and then.

To its left looking out to sea lies Pompey reawakened - Gunwharf Quays with its cosmopolitan mix of designer shopping outlets, restaurant and bars, Manchester-esque canal and exclusive waterfront apartment developments.

To the right sits Portsmouth of yore - overshadowing, arguably in more ways in one, the historic naval dockyard while stereotypical blocks of high rise flats sit uncomfortably on the horizon.

Talking to visitors to Gunwharf this week, there is the overriding feeling that although there have been almost unforgivable cock-ups along the way, Portsmouth does now have its long-awaited icon.

The city went in search of the wow factor and seems to have nailed it.

As Strategic Director for Economy, Culture and Community Safety, Barbara Thompson puts it, "To have a building that has no formal function and isn't providing an educational or social service is a sign a city is moving up. Iconic buildings are a sign of confidence.

"It will make people stop and think about where they are, like the Angel of the North. Our challenge is to ensure the words they then use to associate with Portsmouth are what it is today and not what it was.

"The world evolves and the tower gives us a hugely different dimension we're able to market without forgetting we have all the great heritage."

Ching and Thompson say pursuing the WOW factor requires unwavering nerve.

It involves a vision, a perseverance to believe in what you are trying to accomplish and the willingness to identify and understand potential stresses that occur in dealing with a number of partners.

Council commitment, both officers and politicians, is also paramount while Ching adds, "you cannot underestimate the amount of time and resources, not just cash, that is required."

Ching and Thompson do not have a crystal ball to foresee if income generated by the Spinnaker will justify the overspend on the project.

They maintain visitors have already increased 40 per cent in four years and Ching insists a proportion of the tower's profits will be going back to the benefit of the taxpayer.

In Southampton, where recent prosperity has been fuelled by the successful West Quay complex, planners are keen to boost its tourism revenue beyond the current £165m.

Generation of a WOW factor will no doubt be crucial.

The question is whether a Spinnaker-style icon is needed to do it?

The Daily Echo is going all out to track down and identify the elusive WOW Factor

Let us know what you think by e-mailing us at newsdesk@soton-echo.co.uk or write to the Daily Echo newsdesk, Newspaper House, Test Lane, Redbridge, Southampton SO16 9JX