Las Cuevas: Setback Line, Revetment and a Proposed Hotel

Advice: refuse the application as submitted at 55 m, and grant consent only with a setback of at least 90–105 m from the present high-water mark, plus conditions on the revetment.

Reasons:

1. The 30 m line is obsolete. It was written in 1988, before any measured erosion rate existed. Using the measured 2.1 m/year, 50 years of retreat equals about 105 m, and even 30 years gives 63 m. A wall at 55 m therefore falls inside the projected erosion zone within the design life of a hotel - the development would be defending itself within two to three decades.
2. The trend is chronic, not a one-off. Retreat of 42 m in 20 years, with beach width halving from 39 m to 18 m, is steady loss, not hurricane damage that might reverse.
3. The revetment is not a neutral gift. It protects the hotel's footprint but hard structures on an eroding coast interrupt longshore drift, starve the beach downdrift and cause end-scour. The jetty 300 m updrift already shows sand loss, which tells us the direction of net drift and where the deficit will be passed - toward the village.
4. Approval must not transfer risk. The 320 residents, 45 boats and the school cannot retreat as easily as a hotel company.

Conditions should include: setback aligned to the measured rate; an independent shoreline monitoring programme; a downdrift compensation or nourishment fund; and no rock armour without a sediment-budget study.

A revetment works by fixing the line and absorbing wave energy, but it does not create sand. Its effects travel along the shore.

• Interrupted drift: waves move sand along the coast. A 250 m hard structure crossing the beach acts as a barrier, trapping sand on its updrift side and cutting supply to the downdrift side. If the jetty's sand loss indicates the drift runs from hotel toward village, the village beach will narrow faster than 2.1 m a year.
• End-scour: wave energy reflected off the rock is concentrated at the two ends of the structure, often producing accelerated erosion exactly where the village beach begins.
• Profile steepening: a fixed wall prevents the beach from migrating landward. As sea level and storms continue, the beach in front is squeezed and eventually drowned, so the village loses its landing area and the slipway loses its approach.
• Loss of a natural buffer: the village relies on the beach to absorb storm waves. Once it is gone, waves reach the fish shed, the school and the 45 boats directly.

The net effect is that the hotel buys its own safety with sand that currently protects the village - a classic case of a private benefit creating a public cost.

The 2004–2024 peg survey gives a rate but not a full picture. The authority needs:

• Longer shoreline record: aerial photographs or charts from before 2004, and repeat GPS or drone surveys, to test whether 2.1 m/year is a long-term trend or partly driven by one hurricane.
• Sediment budget and wave climate: where sand comes from, where it goes, and how the jetty and any revetment would alter that. Without this, downdrift impacts are estimated, not measured.
• Bathymetry and beach profiles: to see whether the nearshore is steepening or the beach is simply rolling back, which changes how a revetment behaves.
• Sea-level and storm-surge projections: the 50-year setback should be based on future as well as past erosion.
• Land tenure: who owns the strip between 30 m and 90 m, and whether villagers hold customary rights to the beach and slipway.
• Socio-economic valuation: the fishery's annual value compared with 70 permanent jobs, and whether the 120 construction jobs are local or imported.
• An environmental impact assessment of the revetment, including its effect on the primary school's safety.

A 60-day deadline is a reason to commission a focused study, not to approve on incomplete evidence.