It has been a long time coming but the Environment Agency have finally admitted that they have no interest in providing protection from flooding or erosion to Shoreham Sailing Club. Simply put they stated that we, as a business, are not a priority for the EA and therefore can be left to flood. What this means for all our neighbouring properties is that they are regarded as being above the highwater level and are not at risk of flooding.
The EA have deemed the ‘high ground’ to the North of the club and curb stone in the car park to the northwest is sufficient to withstand a 1 in 300-year flood and this is all that is required to protect the residential property and highways in the local area.
They said that Soldiers Point’s almost total erosion is not the EA’s fault, but the fault of Shoreham Port for not topping up the beach with shingle and maintaining the groynes. They claim that it has nothing to do with the dramatic tidal changes created by the installation of SSC’s solid concrete slipway. Understandably the Port fervently dispute this; we agree with the Port’s point of view and have the photographic evidence to support the immediate changes to the beach and Soldiers Point that occurred as soon as the slipway was installed.
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- 2017
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- 2018
What do we do now? The EA will only return if the houses in the local area flood. There is no plan to prevent this from happening and you only need to go to the car park at Soldiers Point to see that it is only a matter of time before the ground level washes away. I urge all residents of Shoreham Beach to write to your MP Tom Rutland, Adur DC and share on social media the disgraceful neglect from the EA to a problem they are solely responsible for creating and have decided to do nothing about.