Brighton and Hove Council have released further documents concerning the latest phase of the project along Kings Esplanade, Hove, to remove seven existing groynes (six concrete, one timber) and install nine new timber groynes, replenish the shingle beach with 160,000 m³ of marine-dredged material, and raise a 50-metre section of the King Alfred sea wall with reinstated heritage railings. The project forms part of the Brighton Marina to River Adur Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management (FCERM) Scheme, a partnership between Brighton & Hove City Council, Adur District Council, Shoreham Port, the Environment Agency and the Western Esplanade Management Company. See More shingle and better groynes.
The planning application, submitted 28 October 2025 by JBA Consulting for Brighton & Hove City Council, seeks to discharge conditions 4-13 of permission BH2024/02513, including biodiversity, archaeology, and intertidal survey requirements. Together these documents confirm that the Hove frontage is entering a major, environmentally-governed reconstruction phase - balancing climate-defence engineering with commitments to sustainability, ecology, and public amenity. The works - to start in December - will form part of a strategy designed to provide a 1-in-200-year standard of protection for at least fifty years, addressing sea-level rise and erosion pressures.
The Construction Environmental and Social Management Plan (Van Oord, revised 24 October 2025) outlines how the year-long build will proceed from December 2025, with the main compound on Western Lawns and a smaller ‘plant refuge’ near the Southern Water outfall. Noise and vibration will be monitored weekly, and dredged shingle pumped ashore and profiled daily to avoid overnight stockpiles. The plan identifies multiple sensitivities - residential blocks, heritage seafront architecture, bathing-water quality, marine ecology, and a buried medieval settlement - and prescribes detailed mitigation covering noise, dust, lighting, waste, fuel storage, invasive species, and archaeological protection.
An ecological baseline survey by JBA Consulting (September 2025) recorded limited species diversity typical of a high-energy shingle foreshore. Algal and invertebrate colonisation was largely confined to the lower sections of the groynes, where Ulva seaweeds, winkles and barnacles dominated, and small mussel colonies occupied gaps between planks. The report recommends using Integrated Greening of Grey Infrastructure (IGGI) features - rope wraps, honeycomb blocks, and concrete ‘Vertipools’ - to encourage marine growth and deliver biodiversity net gain in line with the Environment Act 2021. These eco-textures will be fitted to the new groynes, partly as an educational resource under the city’s Our City Our World programme.
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