Natural England has published its latest 2024 footpath plans for the Chichester Harbour area including the stretch affecting our Maisemore seawall  (July 16 2024). Those plans were signed off by the Secretary of State.

Some residents in Maisemore have kept up to speed with what Natural England was planning – and the latest NE plans/drawings have been on our website for about a year.   Some have taken a very active interest in letting Natural England know what they thought about these plans. 

Everyone in Maisemore, back in 2019, was given the opportunity to comment on what NE said about what they were planning along here. There were a number of letters from Maisemore people about this but there were no NE plans drawn back then and no mention of the type of path structure. Certainly there was no mention of a boardwalk. This was a much later invention.

In recent years, despite many of us letting NE know that we were NOT in favour of having a boardwalk, it is now very likely that it will be built - leading from the raised path - for about 30 metres westward until it goes into the shingle of the beach.  This would be BEFORE  the ramp that goes up into the Maisemore dinghy park.

The newly planned boardwalk will not be attached to the seawall but it will be about a foot away from it.  The maximum height of the walking area of the boardwalk would be about 3 feet above the beach and get lower as the beach slowly gets higher. (Basically the new boardwalk would span the deep water that collects at highest tides in the low beach area outside no 50’s back garden.) ……

Coastal Partners (a local authority organisation) have done regular reports on our Maisemore seawall in recent years and have said (in 2022): “Should the undermining of the seawall continue, consideration should be taken by the owner for remedial options.”  (The owner is Maisemore Gardens Ltd of course). Coastal Partners also added: “ Longer term, consider whether the ramp at the end of the footpath needs extending further to reduce the risk of any undermining should beach levels lower.” 

Maisemore Gardens Ltd (the Directors) know that the beach level along here HAS definitely dropped in level as surface beach  material has been washed away.  Graphs are available to show this on the Coastal Partners’ reports on the Maisemore website (graphs in this document). Will the MGL Direcotors develop a plan of action to ensure that the seawall is regularly monitored/repaired?

It should be noted that some people in Maisemore do not believe that the seawall is being undermined at all. But many of us probably see that as the shingle has moved away along the base of the seawall, so the sea is able to undercut it. We must recognise that even IF there is a boardwalk in place, high tides will still reach the base of the seawall under the boards and worsen any undercutting. This may not be fast, but it must be considered.

 MGL Directors know that they have to investigate how much work is needed on the seawall ASAP - while they can still access the base of it without any boardwalk in the way.  No doubt they will put a Maisemore Seawall Plan in place soon.

If you want to read more information about the decision making the NE documents are here:  https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coastal-access-section-52-notice-for-south-hayling-to-east-head.  One of these, that is 250+  pages long, has much information about Maisemore in the evidence at the back of the report.