Coastal Management Case Study -Lyme Regis

(mostly hard engineering, but has a mix of both hard and soft)

1. Where is Lyme Regis situated?- Dorset, South West England. There are crumbling cliffs to the west and east of the town.
2. How many people live there?- 4400 people.
3. What is its main income?- Tourism as it is on the Heritage Jurassic Coast  (so Dinosaurs. E.g. Fossils).
4. Why were the sea defences crumbling in the 1990’s?- They were crumbling because the winter storms had removed beach material, allowing waves to undermine the base of the walls.
5. Why didn’t the authorities just let the coast retreat?- Too much was invested in the town to allow this to continue. Lyme Regis was not going to be effective, affordable and environmentally sustainable.
6. How have changes in the seabed over the past two centuries led to the increase in the erosion of the sea walls? The seabed and shore platform in front of the sea walls has undergone considerable erosion and lowering over the last two centuries and as a result the sea walls exposure to wave attacks has increased.
7. What type of mass movement was this coast susceptible to? The coast was susceptible to land slides along the coast. The shale that the town is built on are relatively weak and particularly unstable if they become saturated.
8. What is the dilemma that planners faced with hard vs. soft engineering? (see page 120; 'A plan for coastal defence')-The dilemma that planners faced with hard vs soft engineering was to find a balance in the need to protect existing land uses with preserving the attractive character of the harbour area.
9. Describe and explain each phase of the defence plan at Lyme Regis.- Phase 1 provided the eastern part of the town with sea defences while also improving Lyme's sewerage system. Phase 2 aimed to protect the foreshore along the main frontage from the sea and to stabilize the land behind
10. Summarise the cost benefit analysis of the scheme; what were the cost compared to the benefits? (see pp122-123, be specific to where they have and have not protected the coast as well)- Before the scheme was allowed to go ahead a Cost/benefit analysis had to be undertaken. This meant the council had to prove to the government that there would be sufficient economic benefit in implementing the shemes for it to be viable and receive government funding. Coastal defences would be placed in areas where the coast/benefit ratio was above 5, however it would be on a sliding scale, those with the highest e.g. Cobb Gate to the harbor 6.27 would get the most protection as it was highly populated with lots of housing and infrastructure. Those with the lowest e.g. East Cliff 5.74 would get the least. The East cliffs (near Charmouth) are unstable and prone to landslides, this means that they are sparsely populated to begin with and so are being allowed to retreat naturally.

     Other benefits:

• more sand and shingle on the beach 
• new promenade
• increased shelter around harbour
• improved ramp access to gardens and Holmbush carpark
• relandscaped public gardens
• improvement to Cobb Road
• access along beach, even at high tide.  

11. Though the defences at Lyme Regis are a mixture of hard and soft engineering, they are mainly hard. Have the planners got the right balance here? Explain your answer…

As their land needs protecting to keep the communities homes, themselves, businesses and other important features of the area safe. This would make sure that the input of money would be more secure and less likely to be lost due to the previous high risk of floods. Also this prevents communities being potentially broken up.

Also, the beach made up by imported sediment could be a new tourist attraction that could potentially given the area the reputation of a tourist resort and attract more tourist potentially improving the economy for the locals as their businesses will benefit for the higher number of tourists.

Furthermore, they do try to be eco friendly where they can by not protecting areas of land where this is no settlement.

ALTHOUGH this could be turned as a negative impact to the environment, meaning there is an imbalance in the types of engineering used, as the area is Jurassic land. This means the land is a massive world heritage and by letting some untouched land to continue being eroded is, in some peoples eyes, a waste of such historical meaning and value. 

12.Would this type of management be suitable everywhere? As not all coasts need protecting as they are not affected by high tides, storms or destructive waves.