Calafell is a municipality on the Tarragona coast with a marked population seasonality, with a resident community of approximately 31,500 inhabitants which increases by almost 500% during the summer months and public holidays thanks to sun and beach tourism, a sector that constitutes one of the main economic drivers of the town.
Its coastline extends over almost 6 km, with a beach width that varies greatly between 180 m in the widest sections near the port of Segur de Calafell and around 30 m in the narrowest sectors.

In recent years, the Calafell Town Council has promoted various management measures with the aim of balancing environmental, protectionist and economic interests. These actions include nature-based solutions, artificial beach regeneration and urban deconstruction. Calafell has been a pioneer in the preventive deconstruction of the seafront promenade: 800 m² of structures were removed to prevent collapse due to storms, becoming the first case of its kind in an urban area in Spain. This initiative was complemented by artificial regeneration, consisting of moving sand from areas of abundant availability to eroded areas.
This regeneration is less aggressive than the contribution of external sand, as it maintains granulometric coherence and helps to compensate for local imbalances generated by coastal infrastructure such as ports or groynes.

In another area of action, the municipality, in collaboration with the University of Girona, has implemented and monitored sustainable management through the installation of wind catchers, vegetation and cordoning of dune areas. This management model, based on nature-based solutions, has shown particularly positive results: the restored dunes attached to the seafront promenade have accumulated more than 1,000 m³ of sand, which acts as a natural protection barrier of the promenade itself. In parallel, the test field located on Llevant beach has accumulated a similar volume, functioning not only as a protective element and refuge for biodiversity, but also as a strategic reservoir of sediments available to be mobilised towards more eroded areas when necessary.

Calafell is committed to dune restoration through Nature-based Solutions as a measure of adaptation and resilience against climate change, through the installation of wind catchers, the cordoning of dune areas and flora management, along with constant monitoring.

Actions

Among the basic actions to be developed by the project are regeneration and dune restoration. The municipality of Calafell, with extensive experience in these areas, has carried out actions that allow the evolution, maintenance and monitoring of the changes produced by the various interventions in the beach-dune systems.
To continue this work, Segur beachhas been selected to continue developing actions that allow the restoration of urban dunes.
The DUAL project has scheduled the restoration of the dune habitat in this sector of the beach. To this end, Nature-based Solutions (NbS) will be developed, consisting of:

  • Placement of winter sand traps.
  • Cordoning of the upper beach.
  • Management of access points from the seafront promenade through the recovering dune system, to avoid the frequent occupation of this area

Additionally, the following will be carried out:

  • Planting of plant species native of the dune habitat during the autumn period, to fix the morphology acquired with the sand traps.
  • Removal of invasive species during spring.

Furthermore, the ecological restoration of the artificial wetland of Calafell is planned, which will consist of:

  • Topo-hydrographic rebalancing of the channel that flows into the beach.
  • Removal of invasive species from the lagoon.
  • Transformation of the lagoon front into a dune system.
  • Installation of managed access points.
  • Repopulation with species native to the area.

All these actions will be designed and planned by consensus between the University of Girona and Calafell Town Council, and monitored through the analysis of beach-dune geomorphology; the analysis of the coastline with remote sensors such as dronees and webcams; and the analysis of the site’s ecology through fieldwork, to determine the effect of the removal of invasive species and repopulation with species native to dune habitats.

To facilitate the project, action 5, dedicated to institutional and citizen awareness, will be developed in Calafell, as well as in Sainte-Marie-la-Mer.
This action will allow the municipality of Calafell to benefit from the organisation of citizen awareness through the holding of perception workshops with local stakeholders. AFLE elected officials will also be able to meet in person to exchange the obstacles and facilitating factors they identify in their territories. To this end, various tasks will involve Calafell:

  • Organisation and facilitation of a citizen participatory workshop to collect testimonies from users.
  • Organisation of a meeting and fieldwork day for managers (elected officials and technicians).
  • Creation of a photographic and testimonial exhibition from the workshop and the meeting and fieldwork day; a medium to contrast the views and approaches of users and institutions.
  • Drafting of a action summary to highlight the lessons learned and good practices, with the aim of facilitating local dialogue and the progress of planning projects.