Background
ASBS CARO and Cork County Council, in collaboration with UCC/MaREI, secured funding to participate in the Horizon Europe A-AAGORA Project. This initiative focuses on Integrated Coastal Zone Management, using soft measures alongside hard engineering solutions to enhance coastal resilience. The project involves working with local communities, biodiversity planning, and ecosystem restoration. CARO/CCC’s role is to establish demonstrator sites in Ireland to test approaches and share findings with other European regions. The project is part of a consortium led by Portuguese and Norwegian partners, who are also developing their own demonstrator sites.
Solution
Secured Horizon Europe funding for the project. Established demonstrator sites for pilot projects in collaboration with UCC/MaREI. Engaged local stakeholders, including government bodies and community groups, to ensure broad participation. Installed a static coastal monitoring camera at Inchydoney Beach, Cork. Deployed two CoastSnap cradles, enabling citizens to capture coastline changes and contribute to a global coastal monitoring database. Promoted CoastSnap’s community beach monitoring system to enhance citizen engagement in tracking coastal erosion
Benefits
This project strengthened European collaboration on coastal resilience strategies through shared demonstrator sites. It increased public awareness and participation in coastal monitoring via the CoastSnap initiative and provided valuable data on coastal changes, informing future policy and mitigation efforts against erosion.