Dear Resident

Gorleston Coastal Protection Second Public Meeting:
St Andrews Church Hall Gorleston Great Yarmouth
7:OOpm Tuesday 22 March 2005

Please find the attached notes which were produced from the meeting that took place on Monday 24 January 2005 between the Council (and its Coastal Advisors, Halcrow) and a number of residents who had been identified at the public meeting at Gorleston Library on 29 September 2004.

The notes from the meeting have been compiled by Council Officers who minute our formal committees and they were then distributed to those who took part requesting comments etc. Mr Campbell (no comment), Mr Johnson and Mr Tim Watson responded and their comments are included in italics.

Mr Watson raised a fundamental issue and I have included in full a section from his letter which I hope reflects his point clearly. It is an issue that will need clarification at the public meeting so there is no misunderstanding for the future.

My own understanding was that it was said that if there was an 'emergency' or urgency item of disrepair affecting the sea wall the Council would obviously carry the necessary 'patch and mend' repair, any substantial longer term sustainable repair scheme would be subject to achieving DEFRA funding.

This is not an unusual position since all authorities who are responsible for Coastal defence, be it a District (Borough) Council or the Environment Agency, rely on successful funding bids from DEFRA to enable them to carry out 'defence schemes'. In the case of Great Yarmouth our Engineers and Consultants continually monitor our coastline and submit bids to address specific areas depending on the risks and whether (probably more importantly in bid terms) any such work meet the application rules which DEFRA apply. Recent past work along the Californian/Scratby cliff base, the 'rip-rap' at Gorleston and the recent works at Caister on Sea were carried out using Government (DEFRA) monies.

Residents are now part of the Consultation process for the Councils current bid for Gorleston.

At the public meeting on 22 March 2005, Council Consultants Halcrow will present a scheme based on the opinions expressed at the meeting held on 24 January 2005. This will direct the bid application to reflect a scheme carrying out a more substantial repair to the sea wall together with a 5 year monitoring programme of the beach to establish more robustly actual sand movement, attrition or gain.

There has been some difficulty confirming the meeting date for a number of reasons including the availability of key people and obtaining a venue of adequate size. We have already apologised for underestimating the number of people who wished to attend the meeting at our normal Gorleston Library venue which did cause us both health and safety concerns as well as disappointment to those residents who were not able to enter the conference area. St Andrews will allow a 200 seated audience.

The meeting will be chaired by Councillor Collins in his capacity as Deputy Leader of the Council.

John Hemsworth

Head of Environment and Health