Cape Town beach gets coastal protection treatment

The installation of a revetment at the Milnerton beachfront to mitigate the impact of storms and rising sea levels on adjacent infrastructure is complete, the City of Cape Town said.

The Milnerton Retreat beachfront project is spearheaded by the City’s Coastal Management branch to improve Cape Town’s long-term resilience to climate change.

The work commenced at the end of August 2022.

Engineers from the City’s Coastal Management branch did an assessment of the damage, and conducted a detailed feasibility study in 2018 in collaboration with specialist coastal engineering consultants.

These included:

• investigating the coastal processes,

• long-term beach erosion trends, and

• geotechnical conditions at the site.

The study assessed various options while also considering the environmental impact, flexibility, cost and risks of each option. 

The conclusion was to build a geo-container revetment for protection against coastal processes and high seas in the medium-term.

Facts about the geo-container revetment:

• the revetment is constructed from approximately 720 sand-filled geo-containers,
• each container has a mass of 2,5 ton,
• the revetment foundation is buried 2,3m below the current beach level,
• the revetment has an expected design life of 15 years, and its condition will be assessed throughout its design, lifetime as coastal conditions change.