The construction of the reef will be an exciting tourist attraction as people can watch the activity from the beach. The building of the surf reef has been planned to take place over the summer months, as ideal calm weather conditions are essential. The reef is made from 55 large geo-textile bags, which will be pumped hard with sand. To help facilitate this, 15,000m3 of extra material was procured separately for the reef and delivered as part of the 2007 beach replenishment. It was placed between the Honeycombe Chine development and near Manor Steps. As a result of the delay to the scheme caused by the granting of the FEPA licence, some of that material was lost over the winter period. The recent beach replenishment ‘top up’ allowed for some more material to be procured in the most competitive way but it meant delivery was limited to the Portman Ravine area. This has to be moved to the area next to the reef construction site.

In order to specifically avoid disruption to beach users and beach hut tenants, the sand will be transferred overnight. There will be no activity or machinery moving during the day and there will be access to the beach throughout the day.

Some lengths of orange plastic safety netting have been placed within the existing promenade railings around Portman Ravine and between groynes 23 to 26. This netting is extended at night to cover access points down onto the sand in order to provide a safe working area for the tractors and trailers to transfer the sand. The netting is being removed each morning from the access points onto the beach.

People will have easy access to the beach during the day throughout this work period, which is expected to take up to three weeks. We hope that people appreciate that this temporary work will make Boscombe one of the most innovative and exciting beaches in the UK, and will provide the perfect viewpoint to watch the construction of the first artificial surf reef in the northern hemisphere.

The majority of the work will take place out to sea, however there will be beach-based operation. About one third of the groyne area in front of the Overstrand complex will be used for this compound. The sand for the reef will be harvested outside normal beach visitor hours.