{"id":295,"date":"2025-09-25T08:18:56","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T07:18:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ourlocality.org\/givenatureachance\/?p=295"},"modified":"2025-09-25T11:43:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T10:43:09","slug":"leave-that-beach-alone-why-defending-the-line-often-backfires","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ourlocality.org\/givenatureachance\/2025\/09\/leave-that-beach-alone-why-defending-the-line-often-backfires\/","title":{"rendered":"Leave That Beach Alone: Why Defending the Line Often Backfires"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u201cThe wind maketh the dunes and the sea taketh.\u201d<\/strong> That biblical cadence captures the truth of our shorelines: beaches and dunes are never fixed, but in constant flux. Yet again and again, landowners and local authorities try to \u201chold the line\u201d against waves and tides, pouring money into rock, concrete, and sand fences. The result? Expensive failure, ecological loss, and landscapes more fragile than before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In East Lothian, where the Shoreline Management Plan (SMP)<\/a> was first drawn up in 2002, we can see two archetypal situations: (1) dunes eroding faster than they accrete, where farmers and golf managers spend heavily trying to defend the line; and (2) sandy beaches disappearing because their natural sand supply has been cut off, often by golf reclamations or coastal defences that block sediment drift. In both cases, the SMP evidence is stark1<\/a><\/sup>: the more we intervene, the less resilient our coast becomes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leave_That_Beach_Alone_Briefing<\/a>Download Briefing<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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1. When Dunes Erode Faster than They Grow<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Take Broad Sands and West Links (Unit 11 in the SMP, near Yellowcraig)<\/strong>. Here, the foredunes regularly erode in storm seasons, cutting into the links and threatening golf greens. Faced with this, landowners have tried revetments, gabions, fences, even ad-hoc rubble dumping. But the SMP was blunt: \u201cAdoption of Hold the Line along a naturally adjusting shoreline \u2026 would starve the adjacent shoreline of sediment, transferring the erosion problem elsewhere\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In other words, by armouring one stretch of dune, you rob the next bay along of sand. Worse, the SMP warned that hard defences here would damage features of the SSSI<\/strong> and SPA<\/strong> \u2014 the internationally protected dune habitats and bird roosting sites that make this coast special. The recommendation was not to build, but to accept natural cycles of erosion and accretion, while using only light-touch measures like fencing or planting to keep visitors from trampling fragile dune faces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Modern science backs this up. A 2024 study from the U.S. showed unmanaged dunes had greater root biomass, more species richness, and better storm resilience than those \u201cstabilised\u201d by sand fencing and planting regimes (Nielsen et al. 2024, Scientific Reports<\/em>). The conclusion was clear: dunes work best when left to their own rhythms. Farmers and golf clubs spending six figures on rock and fencing are not just wasting money \u2014 they\u2019re weakening the very systems they want to protect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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2. When Sand Supply is Cut Off, the Beach Vanishes<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The second case is even more sobering. Along parts of East Lothian\u2019s open coast, notably at East Dunbar<\/strong>, beaches have thinned and shrunk because their natural sand inputs have been starved. The SMP noted that future erosion of East Dunbar beach was \u201cheavily dependent on sediment supply\u201d \u2014 and that supply had been constrained by decades of reclamations, harbour works, and land take for golf.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At Dunbar Golf Course (Unit 19)<\/strong> the situation was almost tragicomic. To defend greens, rubble and rock were tipped onto the shore. The SMP described these as \u201cunsightly and unnatural,\u201d transferring erosion elsewhere. Its prescription? No Active Intervention<\/strong>, and even removal of the rubble, because the natural shoreline was stable or accreting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a textbook example of \u201ccoastal squeeze.\u201d Beaches and dunes need space to migrate inland as sea levels rise. But when their sand sources are blocked, and their seaward face is armoured, they have nowhere to go. They don\u2019t simply stay put \u2014 they disappear. The irony is that golf, a sport utterly dependent on the coastal links landscape, has in places undermined the very dunes and beaches that created it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Why Defending the Line Fails<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Both these cases reveal the same dynamics:<\/p>\n\n\n\n