MARA approves Council’s application for Portrane coastal protection scheme
MARA, the Maritime Area Regulatory Authority, have approved Fingal County Council’s application for the construction of a coastal protection scheme at Burrow Beach in Portrane where there have been issues with coastal erosion in recent years.
It is the first Strategic Infrastructure Development (SID) relating to Coastal Protection to obtain a Maritime Area Consent (MAC) from MARA since it was established in 2023 as part of a new streamlined system for regulation of the maritime area.
The awarding of the consent allows Fingal County Council to make a planning application to An Coimisiún Peanála for coastal protection works at Burrow Beach and the Council hopes to have this lodged in Autumn of this year.
Several years ago, the Council engaged specialist engineers from RPS to study the issues within the Rogerstown Estuary and prepare a plan for interim and long-term solutions. This led to the installation of 1km of Seabee concrete units on Burrow Beach which have slowed down the rate of erosion.
Having examined all the long-term options to reduce the rate of erosion at Portrane, RPS proposed the installation of specially designed Y-shaped groynes structures which will be complimented by a beach re-nourishment scheme in order to achieve a suitable beach level. The plan is to reduce incident wave energy along the coastline by limiting the prevailing water depth and thus mitigating the threat of erosion. The groynes will regulate the movement of sand across the beach and prevent the sand being stripped from the beach during a single storm event. This system is already in use at Clacton-on-Sea in England.
The Mayor of Fingal, Cllr Tom O’Leary, said: “This is an important milestone in the Council’s efforts to construct an effective coastal erosion defence system on Burrow Beach in Portrane. The next step to prepare an application for planning permission to An Coimisiún Pleanála and I look forward to that being processed quickly as there is a clear need for groynes to be put in place as soon as possible.”
The Chief Executive of Fingal County Council, AnnMarie Farrelly, said: “I would like to thank Matthew McAleese, Kevin Halpenny and the team in the Planning and Strategic Infrastructure Department as well as our consultants RPS for the tremendous work they have done to secure the Maritime Area Consent for this project. We are leaving no stone unturned in our efforts to provide a long-term solution to the issue of coastal erosion in Portrane and it’s great that we can now proceed to the next step in the process.”
The Council will now convene a meeting of the Fingal Coastal Liasion Group to brief them on the awarding of the Martitime Area Consent and the next steps in the project. The Group was set up in 2016 in response to the ongoing concerns in relation to Coastal Erosion and Coastal Flooding in Fingal and to meet the need for a coherent structured response to address these concerns and improve communication between relevant stakeholders. The Group provides a forum for discussion of the approaches to planning for and dealing with the problems of Coastal Erosion and Flooding and is made up of County Councillors, Council Officials and community members from each of the affected areas in Fingal which are Rush (North Beach and South Beach), Portrane and Sutton.