Erosion between L’Ancresse forts ‘should be a priority’
COASTAL erosion between Fort Doyle and Fort Le Marchant in the Vale should be a higher priority for Environment & Infrastructure, the Vale Commons Council has said.
Council president Peter Blake said the committee needed to protect what the island had before it is lost completely.
‘We’ve been in contact with them and are obviously trying to get them to do something about it as it’s almost back to the footpath, so it does need addressing,’ he said.
A spokesman for Agriculture, Countryside and Land Management Services confirmed it had been approached by the council and that this has been considered.
He said the committee would be responding formally to the council as soon as possible.
The council has also been urging the States to keep the German anti-tank wall at L’Ancresse to avoid damage to the coastline.
The States decided last year to support E&I’s £1m. proposal to demolish a 130-metre section of the wall and encourage sandy dunes to form, controlled by two protective rock groynes.
However, that work has been pushed back to 2019.
Mr Blake said in the habitant of the Clos du Valle pamphlet that the council, by a majority, was against removing the wall and felt work of properly maintaining sea defences had been ‘skimped’.
‘In short, removing rather than bolstering the sea defences at L’Ancresse East is seen as experimental and foolhardy, at a time when global warming is leading to increasingly violent and unpredictable weather,’ he said.
Mr Blake said removing the wall would be expensive and they had concerns about flooding, particularly around the golf course’s 15th hole.
The anti-tank wall and German fortifications were also mentioned as a growing historical interest and so should be protected.
n More information on the issues raised can be discussed by habitants at the next annual meeting of the council on 20 April at 7.30pm at the Vale Douzaine Room.
