Abstract
Portballintrae has had a protracted history of human interference ranging from small-scale sand removal to hard coastal engineering. A small, horse shoe embayment and a once popular seaside destination on the north coast of Northern Ireland, it has suffered from progressive sediment loss over the last 116 years. From a once sediment-rich system, with a wide sandy beach, it now contains only a limited amount of sand draped over bedrock and/or gravel substrate and a relatively narrow beach. Installation of a pier in its western section is thought to have interrupted the natural hydrodynamics and set in motion a progressive longshore transport and removal of sand into deeper water. Successive hard engineering ‘solutions’ prompted through public pressure and engineers keen to do business, have been largely ineffective as they failed to address the root causes of erosion in this sediment-starved beach system.
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Acknowledgments
This work is a contribution to the IMCORE (Innovative Management for Europe’s Changing Coastal Resource) project that has received European Regional Development Funding through INTERREG IVB. The author is grateful to Coleraine Borough Council for access to recent engineering reports on Portballintrae. Gratitude is also expressed to Northern Ireland Water and the Ulster Museum for the use of a number of archival photos.
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Jackson, D.W.T. (2012). Portballintrae Bay, Northern Ireland: 116 Years of Misplaced Management. In: Cooper, J., Pilkey, O. (eds) Pitfalls of Shoreline Stabilization. Coastal Research Library, vol 3. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4123-2_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4123-2_6
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