Southport

United Kingdom Coastal 3 - Sufficient

Southport is a sandy beach located at the northern end of the Sefton coastline. It has a very shallow gradient with large areas of sand exposed throughout the tidal cycle. Only at very high water is the beach completely covered by the sea up to the sea wall. There is a promenade above the beach and a pier to the north of the bathing water.

Reviews

No reviews yet.

Write a review

Photos

Upload a photo

Water

Coastal bathing water

Location

Sefton, Merseyside, Sefton District

Season

Designated bathing water since 1988. Official monitoring season runs from May to September.

Water Quality

Sufficient (2025). Assessed under rBWD

Risks

There is a disused outfall south of the pier. There is no impact on bathing water quality from this outfall.
To the north of Southport bathing water there are number of storm, emergency and surface water outfalls that discharge to the River Ribble and its estuary. Sewer overflows operating during, and following, periods of heavy rain can result in reduced bathing water quality at Southport. In 2013 a significant programme of improvements to these overflows was completed by United Utilities to protect bathing water quality. The programme included the construction of a large storage tunnel (40,790 m3) to the south of the River Ribble to store storm flows as well as a number of other individual schemes to improve storm and emergency overflows.
As part of the improvement programme of work for United Utilities (from 2015 to 2021) the storm overflows from Chorley, Blackburn and Preston Sewage Treatment Works have been improved to protect bathing water quality. The programme also requires that storm overflows close to bathing waters have equipment installed to monitor spills to the environment. This will help to identify where bathing water improvements may be needed in the future.
This bathing water is included in the Surfers Against Sewage “Safer Seas Service”. This service can alert you to Combined Storm Sewer Overflow discharges via a phone App and in addition, it includes the Environment Agency Pollution Risk Forecast warnings where they are available. Further details of the service can be found at - http://www.sas.org.uk/safer-seas-service/ and via United Utilities website at http://www.unitedutilities.com/Bathing-Waters-Map.aspx.