Saturday 5 June 2010

Turner Contemporary pressure TDC to sort out stinking seaweed problem

Reported in This is Kent, Turner Contemporary have urged TDC to sort out the stinking seaweed problem.


Would be nice if we had the working harbour, some fishing boats and no smell.

Why can't this be sorted out?

8 comments:

  1. I'd love to see a working harbour too, but it would take a LOT of dredging - 3 metres of silt has accumulated over the centuries according to a recent post on the Thanet Coast Life blog - & presumably IF that happened we'd lose much of Margate Sands at high tide.

    Wasn't the (now barely visable) tunnel in the harbour meant to wash the silt away in the past?

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  2. If you speak to the fishermen,they all say the problem would be solved if the sluice gate(in the corner of the harbour arm)was opened,but they say the council will not listen...

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  3. Margate harbour has been screwed over more times than enough by Thanet District Council. The seaweed has come ashore since time immemorial and will still be coming ashore when the incomers have got fed up of the Turner Contemporary and moved on to their next good cause.
    You only have to look at Ramsgate to see what messing about does to the facilities - when the new port was created the main sands were washed away. Seaweed is natural and is part of the seashore.Strangely enough the beaches arent actually white and perfect as postcards portray.SO if you wish to be in Margate then you have to love it seaweed and all - its only for a few weeks. It is also good for the garden so the environmentalist entrepeneurs could always negotiate a contract to collect and re sell it?????!!!!!

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  4. 14:28, wWhen I said "tunnel" I actually meant the sluice gate.

    16:28, If you read the link it seems that it might not be possible for it to be collected & resold in the near future: "Due to the fact Thanet council has so many beaches to look after, it is currently exempt from Environment Agency rules which forbid the movement of seaweed. However, the exemption runs out in 2010."

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  5. Maid of Kent, the council used Ramsgate Sands for the port infill, so it was a case of dug up not washed away and believe it or not the seaweed used for hundreds of years in agriculture, that went a long way towards creating the garden of England is now classified as toxic waste and can’t be used in agriculture, particularly here in Thanet as it is on top of the aquifer.

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  6. Having been born and bred in Thanet I have no objection to the smell of seaweed or brassicas rotting in the fields as they were smells we grew up with. What I do object to are people who move in with an "image" of how things should be and these illusions rarely allow for reality. it is exactly the same in the country where I now live.
    I am sure though that if you visit the library and trawl the archive copies of the local press you will find that the sands at Ramsgate washed away as a result of altering the action of the tides when the ferry port was constructed. Im fairly certain that was part of the reason for one of the breakwaters but it was a long time ago, the beach used to go about half way out along the East Pier and was reduced to the land end of the pier - i.e virtually nothing.

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  7. Am I missing something? Margate Harbour ~ Seaside ~ Seaweed ~ Smell. Turner would have suspecte as much, why not the ever fragarent Ms Pomeroy?

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