Coastwise Cafés are held twice per year in multiple locations to gather local knowledge and input, build relationships and share progress.
Feedback from these cafés has generated ideas around ways to communicate, identified community concerns, and provided a focus for future project activities.
The drop-in format enables meaningful conversations in a safe place where everyone can express their opinions and concerns within a friendly café setting.
Cafés have taken place in Weybourne, Sheringham, West Runton, Overstrand, Trimingham, Bacton, Walcott and Happisburgh.
The information collected at Coastwise Cafés also helps the team to identify key areas to highlight project priorities and develop coastal transition options.
Housing
Cliff-top water management and drainage
Infrastructure
Beach access
Financial options
Roads and local connectivity
Churches and graveyards
To join the mailing list, and keep up to date on the next Café dates, email coastwise@north-norfolk.gov.uk.
The need to adapt due to coastal erosion is not new. People in Norfolk have been adapting for generations as the coastline has steadily retreated.
In some places, we’ve become reliant on engineered defences, so we don’t see coastal change. But these will not last forever and may not be replaced.
In others, defences are not possible for technical, environmental or financial reasons, so we need to prepare and adapt.
Beaches are dynamic and change from tide to tide, season to season. Depending on wind and tides, the sand can move out to sea and along the coast. This can alter beach levels – the amount and depth of sand on the shore.
Anything we do along the coast needs to recognise and work with the natural processes that cause these fluctuations.
The best form of coastal defence is a beach. When beach levels are low, it can be hard to get onto the beach and the base of our sandy cliffs can be more vulnerable to erosion. As well as being beautiful places, and recreational spaces, beaches are an essential part of limiting coastal erosion and protecting the coast.
As cliffs to erode, they release sand and other materials that make a beach. So in some places on our coast, we need erosion to happen.
Over time, sea level around the world has changed at different rates in different places.
Overall, sea levels are rising putting habitats, infrastructure and communities at increasing risk from the sea. In North Norfolk, the data from monitoring over 30 years shows that sea level is rising by an average of 4mm per year.
Cliffs with soft geology like those we have in North Norfolk are made of materials including sand, gravel, silt and clay. These erode at the base from the impacts of waves and tides.
They can also erode from the top due to the natural build-up of surface water and groundwater, especially after extended periods of heavy rainfall. This build-up can cause sudden collapses and huge cliff slides.