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Comment for TQ6300

Grid square TQ6300 is a flat area of coastal plain that borders the English Channel and is a suburban area of Eastbourne. It has a varied land use with facilities including housing and roads, but much of the area, and particularly the coastal environs, is given over to leisure amenities, which include beach huts, Fort Fun for adventure and soft play, the Sovereign Centre leisure pool, a cycle track for young children, a skate park, Sovereign Park with shingle-adapted plants, a long flat promenade for the use of pedestrians and cyclists, the seafront route of the Dotto Train with request stops, car parks for the easy access of visitors and a continuous 1 km of beaches. Among the boats beached on the shore, there are old winch buildings and store huts bordering the promenade, and this lends a picturesque element to the landscape. Among the natural advantages of this area for holidaymakers are flat land bordering the sea, the south-facing aspect of the Sunshine Coast, and the accessibility of the area; these three fundamental locating factors underlie the concentration of facilities for sport, recreation and leisure pursuits on the coastal strip and do much to explain why this is often a busy area, particularly in the summer months.

Though somewhat sheltered by Beachy Head from the full force of storms approaching up the Channel from the southwest, the coast is still vulnerable to the effects of longshore drift, coastal erosion and floods. While the hazards of erosion and floods certainly apply to the central area near Eastbourne Pier, the area of TQ6300 is generally an area of coastal deposition and has for many hundreds of years been an area of coastal deposition, as can be deduced from the shingle ridges of Sovereign Park and the nearby Crumbles. The beaches of TQ6300 supply shingle on an annual basis, which is used for beach augmentation and for the reprofiling of beaches in the town centre. This is an expensive scheme, but it is more cost efficient for East Sussex County Council and the Department of the Environment to use local beach material to recharge the beaches than to import shingle from dredgers like the Sospan Dow that would spray shingle onto the beaches. The recovery of shingle from the beaches of TQ6300 is part of ‘The Pevensey Bay to Eastbourne Management Scheme’, which has the aim of protecting 15 kilometres of coast between Cooden and Holywell for the next 100 years and is one of the largest of such operations in the country. The operation to recover and transport beach material from beaches in TQ6300 is a highly conspicuous one that involves heavy plant such as mechanical excavators, dump trucks and bulldozers, but as it is done in the winter months, it has only a minimal impact on individuals wanting access to the beaches. Although the operation is expensive, it would be more costly in the long run for Eastbourne not to defend its coastline from the forces and effects of coastal erosion, and so Eastbourne is committed to a future where it must take advantage of the forces of nature that deposit shingle in Grid Square TQ6300 through the agency of longshore drift in order to counteract the loss of shingle from town centre beaches that, if left unchecked, would lead to erosion and floods. This is particularly true in an age when sea levels are predicted to rise by more than a metre over the next 100 years and storms are expected to become more frequent, thereby increasing the risks of coastal erosion and floods.

Much of the recreational and sporting character of grid square TQ6300 comes from the coastal strip, where a variety of sports are practised. As the grid square borders Buzz Active, many of the activities are carried out on the water, and these include such things as swimming, boating, windsurfing, paddle boarding and, on occasion, JetLev. In addition to energetic water sports, the level promenade encourages people to walk, ride a bicycle or use their mobility scooters as they take in the coastal air. To the west of this coastal fringe of recreational facilities, there is a large playing field that hosts events like the travelling fair and circus, while to the north of Prince William Parade, housing dominates the landscape.

Andrew Diack, B.A. (Hons)

TQ6300 : The Sovereign Centre on Royal Parade, Eastbourne, East SussexTQ6300 : Sovereign Centre Skate Park, Eastbourne, East SussexTQ6300 : Sovereign Park, Eastbourne, East SussexTQ6300 : Diggers creating piles of beach material for recycling, Eastbourne