Hotels and Resorts

Beaches are a mobile and responsive habitat, shifting with seasons, severity of storms etc. Though beaches will naturally accrete and erode under these influences it will remain over the years. However, once hotels and associated tourism serving structures are developed along the coast, beaches are effectively stabilised impeding the movement of sand and often resulting in catastrophic erosion of beachfronts. Beaches are essential assets to many tourism destinations, and hotels often turn to the development of shore protection works in an attempt to 'bring the sand back'. Most physical structures developed to counter beach erosion and protect shoreline property from the hazards will actually make matters worse. Groins, seawalls, breakwaters etc have intricate and unforeseen effects on the geomorphology and current patterns, which will often lead to further erosion - although the problem is likely to be 'displaced' further down the coast. Ultimately conserving and protecting mangroves, wetlands, coral reefs and coastal barrier islands is the best solution to protection from natural hazards as they are the best defences against sea-storms and erosion absorbing much of the storms' energy.