After a three year absence, our highly enjoyable and informative ‘Away Day’ is back! This year our visit will be to the heart of Southsea’s heritage seafront, based at the D-Day Story close to Southsea Castle, where the works to complete the current phase of the Southsea Coastal Scheme sea defences can be viewed.
Southsea Seafront sea defences
Portsmouth is the United Kingdom’s only island city, second only to inner London as the most densely populated city in the UK. With no part of the island higher than thirty feet above sea level and significant parts already reliant on ageing sea defences, a massive programme of works in in progress to defend the island against sea level rise. The works are being led by Coastal Partners, a partnership formed of five councils which takes the lead on coastal issues across 246km of Hampshire and West Sussex’s coastline.
Solent Protection Society is an active member of the stakeholder community during Coastal Partners’ engagement with the public over the past few years and continues to take an active interest in the works. Balancing the complexity of the civil engineering work with the sensitivity of the local heritage assets has brought significant challenges.
Coffee and tea will be available from 10.30am in the Dulverton room and at 11.00am the Coastal Partners project team will give an illustrated talk covering the massive scope of the works being carried out to defend Portsea Island against the rising sea level and also the historical artefacts uncovered during the engineering work. After a buffet lunch, we will make the short (300m) walk to Southsea Castle where a full view of the current phase of the works can be seen from the ramparts.
Members of the party will then have a choice of activities for the remainder of the afternoon. Southsea Castle will be open to explore and we have a discounted entry to the D-Day Story and the Tank Landing Craft. The discounted rate of £8.00 will only be available to those who take the option on booking. Without pre-booking, the price on the day will be £14.35 / £11.45 senior.
The D-Day Story
The recipient of a £5 million Heritage Lottery grant in 2018, the D-Day Story tells the story of D-Day, the people behind it and the Battle of Normandy. It is the only museum in the UK dedicated to the Allied Invasion in June 1944. Archive film and photographs together with archive documents and other related items are on display.
For further details, please refer to the D-Day Story website by selecting this link.
Southsea Castle
Southsea Castle was one in a series of forts constructed for King Henry VIII, in what was the most ambitious scheme of coastal defence since Roman times. On 18 July 1545, a French invasion fleet approached Portsmouth causing Henry VIII to mobilise his fleet and engage in the Battle of the Solent. It was during this conflict that his flagship, the Mary Rose, was lost (now to be viewed at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard).
For further details, please refer to the Southsea Castle website by selecting this link.
Long Curtain Moat
For those who would like to see more of the sea defence development, a further option will be a guided walk of around twenty minutes along level ground, to the impressive completed sea defence work with its exposed archaeology at Long Curtain Moat.
Further images of King’s Bastion and Long Curtain Moat can be found at this link.
Directions and Parking:
SatNav users should enter destination postcode PO5 3NT, once you have entered the city of Portsmouth from either the M275 or the A2030, follow signs to ‘The Seafront’ and then follow brown ‘attraction’ signs to ‘The D-Day Story’, which is located on Clarence Esplanade. For an easy landmark, look out for the large tank Landing Craft which occupies a prominent position outside the building.
Further details can be found on the D-Day Story website by clicking this link.
Parking is located next to the D-Day Story and should be paid separately to our Solent Protection Society day. We suggest that you ensure your ticket covers parking until at least 3.30pm. card, cardless, cash or RingGo contactless payment is available.
Solent Protection Society 