Barmston is protected slightly by Flamborough head, which gives it some sheltering from the long fetch
Land use (referring to the beach observation map)
About 80% of the land use in this area is for agriculture, leaving the remaining 20% mainly to the caravan site. There is also a small car park to the south of the caravan site, near the access road. As the cliff is constantly eroding, the caravan site has to be gradually moved back.
Coastal Defence and Cliff management
Rip Rap below the access road, protects this area of the cliff by stopping coastal erosion. It does, however, prevent long shore drift. This has the effect of eroding the coastline after this point at a much faster point, as the waves will have more energy due to carrying no sediment (and there is also no beach)
There is a Concrete groyne around 900 metres south from the rip rap, which stops longshore drift and creates a beach in that area, giving it protection.
There is no cliff management present.
Conclusion
By looking at the land use map and information on this page, Barmston is not considered an important enough place to protect, so little is being done to protect it. The caravan site has limited protection. The agricultural land is not being protected as coastal management coasts a lot of money. The agricultural land does not hold any significant economical status; therefore coastal management in this area will not take place.
Hornsea
Hornsea is a coastal town with sufficient importance, enough to provide it will expensive coastal defences. Without these defences, the area would rapidly start eroding. It receives a lot of high energy waves from the North Sea. It is not sheltered by Flamborough head.
Land use (referring to the beach observation map)
Around 35% of the land use in this area is Residential housing, 20% is Amusements, Retail, Businesses and a Leisure centre, 10% of it is flood gates and boat yards and the remaining 35% is a recreational area and a caravan site (residential)
Coastal defence and cliff management
Concrete sea defences which acts as a wave barrier and also protects the area behind it from flooding. These are very expensive, about £2500m². The ones in Hornsea also have steps/ramps for easy beach access.
The picture to the left is what the coastal defences at Hornsea look similar too
Wooden groynes are also along the beach to prevent longshore drift and also act as a windbreaker.
When the sea wall comes to an end, the coastline drops back slightly and rip rap is placed along that stretch of coastline to protect it.
Conclusion
By looking at the land use map and information on this page, Hornsea is a place that is worth protecting due to the nature of what is there. I.e. Commercial areas and large residential areas. If erosion of the cliff were allowed to take place and Hornsea eroded away, many people’s lives would be affected and their jobs maybe affected too, as Hornsea relies quite a lot on tourism. It is obviously considered as an important area by the council and also by us, as geographers. Residential and business areas are protected by a 3m high wall. The main problem with the sea walls, apart from money issues, is that it isn’t a very aesthetically pleasing to look at. As far as maintaining the area goes, I believe this will happen as long as Hornsea remains economically viable and enough people live there.
Mappleton
The cliffs beyond Mappleton are eroding at an astonishing rate of around 10metres a year. The rock in this area is mainly clay and other soft rocks; it also receives a lot of high energy waves from the North Sea. It is not sheltered by Flamborough head.
Land use (referring to the beach observation map)
Around 15% of it is residential with a church and small local shop, 5% is a car park with toilets, 20% is a Ministry of Defence firing range and the remaining 60% is Agricultural. The main reason why Mappleton receives protection is due to the B142 road that runs 100metres away from the coastline. It is a very important road, which links up all the settlements in the area. Without it, travel around this area would be very hard, and many people would leave the areas as they need to have good transport links to get to their job
Coastal defence and cliff management
A huge amount of rip rap has been very carefully constructed in this area to provide coastal defences. It is constructed in an ‘L’ shape as shown on the diagram. Also there is another rock groyne further up north around 150m away from the ‘L’ shaped one. This will slow down the processes of longshore drift and provide the area with a larger beach to protect the cliffs. £1million was spent on these coastal defences.
The cliff has been angled and graded. The cliff has a layer of plastic under the soil, wire mesh and grass seeds. These, together, hold the cliff together so that that erosion hardly takes place due to the grass holding the soil in place and the plastic sheets prevent erosion by stopping the water seeping into the ground and becoming loose. Instead all the water runs off on the surface.
Conclusion
Mappleton as a village isn’t really a village that is viable for protection. But due to the road and most probably, the MOD site. The area has been protected. The agricultural land south of Mappleton hasn’t had any coastal defences/cliff management money invested into it. The cliff has been graded and rock armoured in areas that are most important. A lot of money has been spent on the Mappleton protection plan, which would not have been spent if it wasn’t for the B1242, which is the backbone transport link for this section of the coastline. Without it many settlements would eventually disappear, as people would not be able to get about. The Mappleton sea defences are a solution to a major problem, but in turn this has made the cliffs past the sea defences, much more susceptible to erosion, creating another problem along the Holderness coastline.
Task 2
Analysing the Pebbles
As we are not geologists, it was hard to determine the rock type at many areas. So the rock type results become insignificant during this report as there isn’t enough data. Attrition is a process that occurs at all three beaches
Barmston Central
At Barmston central, there seemed to be a pattern occurring. The larger rocks/pebbles were found near the cliff, they were also the least rounded of all of the pebbles. The reason for this is that the rocks/pebbles won’t have been weathered a lot in comparison to the other stones, and would have fallen off the cliff. The ones nearer to the sea would have been broken down by the action of waves, which make them become rounder. The stones also become smaller as they are broken down by weathering and the action of the waves.
The largest rocks were found nearer to the cliffs. The average size was 10.9cm x 7.4cm with a roundness of 3.2. These are very big rocks. The smallest stones were found nearer the sea, with the average size of 2.6cm x 0.4cm and a roundness of 4.
Hornsea Central
As there were no cliffs, the first 10 metres was only covered in sand. At about 15 metres, very small rocks were found. With a high roundness of 4.3. At 20metres the rocks became bigger and even more round (4.7), another 5 metres down from that the rocks were very round, with a roundness of 5.4, at 30metres the rocks became very jagged, 2.3 was the average roundness there.
Mappleton Central
For the first 15metres, it is sand. After that there is some medium to smallish sized rocks found here, the average size being 3cm x 2cm. But these were very round, with a roundness score of 6 and were made from granite. In the next 10metres the rocks are very similar to each other 2.5cm x 1.7cm being the average size of them both, but with a roundness of 3.8 and 4.8 respectively, they are not as round as the previous stone. Some very small granite rock is found 35metres from the cliff. With a roundness of 6, these are equally round to the other ones. The sharpest rocks are found near to the sea, being a medium size.
Conclusion
It seems like the smaller rocks are found near to the top of the beach when cliff weathering isn’t taking place. This is due to the fact that a smaller amount of energy is needed to take the smaller rocks up the beach. The larger ones stay nearer to the sea, but are usually less round as they are not always in direct contact with waves, and do not get weathered/action of the waves as much as the ones below the average tide line.
Coastline visions – Bi Polar
Barmston
Barmston seems to be a quiet area of the coast, where hardly anyone uses the beach there. Mainly only the residents of the caravan site or for people taking a walk would use it. The access to the beach is poor, and it looks like the path has been made by people repeatedly walking over the area. There seems to be little income, as there are hardly any services except for a chip shop and an occasional ice cream van. It is relatively a natural area compared to the other 2 beaches.
Hornsea
The Bi-polar vision seems to indicate that Hornsea is there for tourist purposes. There are many facilities and things to do for tourists. Such as: bins, toilets, amusements, ice cream shops, parking, etc. The beach is clean but the sea wall isn’t very aesthetically pleasing to look at. So it is more likely to attract younger people. The money brought in from tourism can be directed back into the community, making it a sustainable economy.
Mappleton
Mappleton is quite a nice beach in my opinion. Although it isn’t there to attract visitors, it has ice cream vans lots, toilets, parking provisions. However, due to the MOD’s warning about “You could be killed”, it has the detrimental effect of deterring potential tourists. It is quiet there, and the area is clean apart from the odd bits of litter. There seems to be hardly any sort of wildlife. Mappleton has not got a sustainable economy; most of the people who live there have to commute a long way, or are retired.
Conclusion
Firstly, I have already made my conclusion on which is the best-protected coastline; Hornsea is by far the most protected, followed by Mappleton and finally Barmston.
The amount of protection an area of the coastline receives is usually dependent on what areas of value are there. Places such as Barmston do not have many factors going for it when it comes to coastal defences. It has a small local economy, which is heavily dependent on commuting to work for the residents of the area. There is hardly any tourism or many facilities. The land isn’t worth much and there is nothing particularly special in this area to make it viable for coastal protection. Hornsea on the other hand has relatively large local economy, plenty of tourism (meaning a source of income for the town), plenty of facilities and the land, has much higher value than that of Barmston.
Factors which could affect whether coastal defences are invested in:
Economic value (Local Economy)
How appealing that area is
Facilities
Commercial value
Tourism
(optional)Special factors e.g. Roads
All the above factors, apart from the special factors, are all to do with money.
Barmston
Does not have much to offer with regards to needing coastal defences. The land use in Barmston is mainly for agriculture, which is not worth much as the United Kingdom already over produces. The caravan park, which isn’t particularly busy as there isn’t much entertainment. As it isn’t very busy, there isn’t much money coming into the area. It does not have any factors which make the area worth considering for protection, so no coastal defences will be built here.
Hornsea
Has a lot to offer. It attracts a lot of money to this area through tourism (it is an appealing seaside resort) which increases the money in its local economy, meaning that more money is invested back into the area. Hornsea satisfies all of the factors which make the area worth considering for protection.
Mappleton
Mappleton does not have much to offer, but there are 2 special factors that mean that Mappleton has coastal protection. The fact that it has a major road running near by; this road has high economical value, as it connects all the villages near by. Thus allowing people to travel to work. Also the MOD shooting range and explosives testing sight is another reason why it may have been protected. Mappleton has a very nice, sandy beach. However, the sign that says ‘Danger of death due to explosives’ is very off putting to tourists. Mappleton does not have high economical value.
(this section is irrelevant to the coursework, but maybe useful to other people)
Holderness Coastal Erosion Analysis Exercise
1. Why have some posts e.g. 4-7 experienced no erosion in the period September 97 – March 98?
Because in and around areas where a great amount of erosion was occurring and it was also an area of high economical value, sea defences have probably been set up or other cliff management schemes.
2. Which site experienced the greatest erosion rate during this period (September – March), suggest possible reasons why?
‘On field boundary opposite Rectory Lane, Tunstall’. There is probably a valid reason why 11.2metres of erosion has taken place. Slightly further up the coast, erosion has stopped, indicating sea defences. This means the process of longshore drift has stopped and the waves have a lot more energy to break down the cliff and erode it. This is the most probable reason.
3. Describe and attempt to explain the distribution of sites experiencing more than 2m. loss during this period (September-March)
4.Describe and attempt to explain the distribution of sites experiencing more than 2m average erosion rate per year.& 5.Describe and attempt to explain the distribution of site experiencing less than 0.5m. average erosion rate per year
Looking at the distributions. I can see that they would make a shape like the one below if put onto a graph.
The peaks of the graphs being the ones with the most erosion occurring.
The average per year takes into account all the years since the post has been set up. So if sea defences are relatively new, it will only just start lowering the average per year.
Where longshore drift is stopped, due to coastal defences (the areas where coastal defences occur, are usually located where there is under 0.5m erosion per year), hardly any coastal erosion occurs. But the areas further south down the coastline, past an area of sea defences (usually the areas with more than 2m of erosion per year), the coastline erodes much higher per year (on average)
6. Which site has lost the most cliff material since the post was originally established, suggest possible reasons why?
‘On fence line S. of dyke, N of Cowden’. By the location name, it does not seem that this site has any economical value, thus has not been protected by sea defences until recently. The rock in this area must have been very soft and the sea defences to the North of it has had a drastic effect on it over a long period of time. It has lost 142.56 metres of cliff since it was established.
7. which site has experienced the highest average erosion rate per year during the total period, suggest possible reasons why?
I am taking the ‘total period’ to be since 1951, so any posts not setup in that year, then the data will not be deemed relevant. Since 1951, ‘On fence line S. of South Cliff, Hornsea’ is where the highest average erosion rate per year occurs. A likely reason for this is a very similar reason to the answer of question 6. The rock in this area is very soft and the sea defences to the North would have been established a long amount of time, having a massive impact on erosion. This area seems to be the most likely place where the waves have the most energy throughout the whole Holderness coastline.
