6 - Solway Basin : Detailed Statements of Environmental Opportunity

This section expands on the Headline Statements of Environmental Opportunity and provides further detail on each of the Statements of Environmental Opportunity.

SEO 1

SEO 1: Conserve and enhance the designated coastal landscapes and the diverse range of habitats of the Solway coast, managing the internationally important coastal and estuary systems, including the intertidal flats, salt marshes and sand dunes, for the species they support, their geomorphology, recreation and tranquillity value and the flood risk protection they provide, in order to aid adaptation to the effects of climate change and enhance their importance in the local economy.

For example by:

• Securing sympathetic management of the diverse array of high-quality semi-natural habitats and the physical processes that support them within the coastal zone, both inside and outside designated sites, including salt marshes, sand dunes, intertidal habitats, vegetated shingle and coastal cliffs.
• Restoring and enhancing the National Character Area’s (NCA’s) suite of coastal Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), Special Areas of Conservation (SAC), Special Protection Areas and Ramsar sites and their component habitats and geological features and processes, such as salt marsh geomorphology and coastal geological exposures, through both targeted measures and wider promotion of the sensitivity and value of these sites. Ensuring that habitat quality is sufficiently high to support habitat specialist species, such as breeding and wintering waders and wildfowl, breeding seabirds and the natterjack toad.
• Ensuring that sustainable management extends beyond the designated site network so that the wider coastal zone is sympathetically managed, with a particular focus on maintaining natural processes and areas of priority and transitional habitats, such as brackish wetlands, with the result that these habitats are present, valued and, where necessary, restored and re-created to provide ecological links, allow for climate change impacts and support the provision of ecosystem services benefits.
• Conserving archaeological evidence of earlier settlement and land use and, where appropriate, securing off-site conservation of artefacts at risk from coastal change, such as the Roman sites on the Beckfoot to Maryport coastline.
• Delivering key actions in the Solway Coast Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) aimed at restoring and enhancing estuarine and coastal character.
• Raising awareness of the cultural heritage specific to the coastal margins, such as ‘waths’ (crossing points over the estuary) and ‘haaf netting’ (a traditional technique for catching salmon) fisheries.
• Establishing a coastal access route that allows for improved access to, and understanding of, the coast while respecting the sensitive habitats and species of the coastal margin.
• Seeking opportunities to re-establish the transitional habitats of the coastal margin such as saline and brackish lagoons.
• Protecting the tranquil and remote character of the Solway coast.
• Managing the impacts of access and recreation in the coastal zone to protect from disturbance sensitive features such as breeding and roosting birds, honeycomb worm reefs and shingle vegetation, and using the profile of the new England Coast Path to raise awareness of the sensitivity of the coastal zone and the role it plays in coastal flood protection.
• Securing sustainable management of coastal shell fisheries to support coastal economies and biodiversity.

SEO 2

SEO 2: Manage and restore the freshwater wetland landscape of the Solway Basin, including internationally important raised bogs and rivers with their associated fens, lakes, riparian woodlands and channels, for the important habitats they provide, their contribution to landscape character, the environmental record and historical assets they hold, and to manage flood risk and maintain water quality.

For example by:

• Securing sympathetic management of the diverse array of high-quality wetlands both inside and outside designated sites, including rivers, valley mires, lowland raised bogs, coastal and flood plain grazing marsh, reedbeds and fens.
• Restoring and enhancing the suite of wetland SSSI and SAC and their component habitats present in the NCA, through both targeted measures and the wider promotion of the value of these sites.
• Protecting and restoring riparian corridors, particularly where ancient woodlands survive, for biodiversity, water quality and flood control.
• Delivering key actions in the Solway Coast AONB management plan aimed at restoring and enhancing wetlands.
• Ensuring that invasive species such as signal crayfish, pitcher plants and Himalayan balsam are managed and do not damage the unique heritage of the NCA.
• Ensuring that wetland habitat quality is sufficiently high to support habitat specialist species such as white-faced darter dragonfly, marsh fritillary and large heath butterflies, lamprey and eels, including species that have been lost in the past, such as the corncrake.
• Ensuring that sustainable management extends beyond the designated site network so that the wider wetland landscape, particularly the physical processes, priority habitats, locally important sites and sites that support transitional habitats, are sympathetically managed; providing ecological links between core sites; supporting species associated with the wider wetland landscape such as breeding waders; reinforcing NCA character; and supporting the provision of ecosystem services benefits.
• Supporting programmes that deliver social, cultural and economic benefits from sustainable management of wetland resources and that promote informed interaction with the wetland landscape, such as educational and volunteer programmes that raise awareness of the unique wetlands in the NCA and promote knowledge of traditional management such as wetland grazing.
• Protecting and restoring lowland raised bogs for their biological, scientific and historical values, including as an archive of past environmental conditions and as a climate regulator.
• Ensuring that ditches and other watercourses have buffers of vegetation, especially trees where appropriate, and riparian habitats along their margins to support riparian species and facilitate species movement, trap sediment and run-off in areas of high erosion risk, and ensure that stock access does not result in sediment entering the watercourses.
• Developing new wetlands that trap sediments manage agricultural flood risk and help support wetland species.

SEO 3

SEO 3: Work with landowners and land managers to protect, enhance and strengthen the network of farmland features; create and expand farmland habitats to enhance biodiversity and improve soil and water quality; strengthen the resilience of habitats to climate change; enhance landscape character; and support a diverse rural economy.

For example by:

• Adapting farming systems to be more flexible in the face of a changing climate, such as establishing pastoral regimes which suit wetter lowlands.
• Seeking adaptations to farming systems such as vegetation buffers, including trees, and more focused nutrient inputs that reduce off-site impacts through diffuse pollution.
• Seeking opportunities to support farm business diversification to establish a robust rural economy through developing links to the visitor economy associated with designated landscapes, sites and the network of long-distance trails.
• Establishing agricultural systems with more diverse swards to benefit both biodiversity and productivity, for example planting grasses which bind soils to reduce soil erosion, encouraging species such as clover which fix nitrogen, and establishing appropriate cutting and grazing regimes to allow flowering and seed to set to support pollinators.
• Maintaining pastoral systems in areas of high erosion risk, such as on steep slopes on the mineral soils, and areas of waterlogged soils throughout, with particular reference to priorities identified by the Catchment Sensitive Farming Programme, which aims to improve water quality and reduce nutrient loading through simple adaptive farm business measures.
• Maintaining arable production on areas of suitable soils, avoiding steep slopes and areas prone to waterlogging, and incorporating measures such as break crops that support the maintenance of soil productivity.
• Encouraging management interventions on arable farmland to benefit farmland bird species such as grey partridge, lapwing, yellow wagtail, tree sparrow, corn bunting, barn owl and yellowhammer.
• Protecting, expanding and connecting surviving areas of ancient woodland, particularly along river corridors and on steep slopes, to support biodiversity, increase resilience to climate change and act as stepping stones for woodland species moving across the landscape.
• Managing and establishing economic woodlands away from the coastal plain by developing links with local biomass power stations and promoting wood fuel as a local energy source.
• Re-establishing coppice management, aiming to support climate regulation by promoting low carbon energy sources. Enhancing the biodiversity of woodland ecosystems by re-establishing managed woodland systems as well as low intervention systems, locally reducing soil erosion; and addressing water quality issues by stabilising watercourse boundaries and steep slopes, and buffering watercourses to trap sediment and run-off.
• Encouraging access and quiet recreational activities that support and benefit from the high-quality rural environment and that make use of the open access areas and network of quiet roads, tracks, bridleways and footpaths, such as walking, cycling, riding, wildlife watching, visiting heritage assets and exploring geological features.
• Working with local landowners and managers to provide facilities such as accommodation and refreshments for users of long-distance routes, and include discreet and imaginative interpretation of the key features and assets of the area.
• Working with local tourism organisations and accommodation providers to establish local routes from villages to key features, for improved recreation and enjoyment, providing clear and engaging information to residents and visitors, thus enabling them to learn about and enjoy the distinctive landscape.
• Ensuring that hedges provide habitat, food such as nectar and berries, and enhanced connectivity for wildlife by securing good management such as cutting regimes that allow flowering and fruiting.

SEO 4

SEO 4: Conserve and promote the historic landscape and settlement character, including the many heritage assets linked to the area’s history as a disputed boundary zone, such as the World Heritage Site of Hadrian’s Wall, promote education and understanding through interpretation, enhance recreation opportunities and ensure that the design of new development enhances the character of the area.

For example by:

• Protecting and restoring the key features of the historic landscape including Hadrian’s Wall and its surrounds, the religious sites of Holme Cultram and Lanercost and the built heritage of Carlisle.
• Promoting awareness of the historic landscape including archaeological sites, buildings and associated landscapes, improving access to sites and linking cultural heritage sites to natural heritage sites and the rights of way network including long-distance paths and cycle ways.
• Conserving archaeological features and palaeo-environmental archives through land management practices – for example, through reversion of arable land to grassland where ploughing threatens the integrity of below- ground archaeology.
• Conserving traditional buildings and developing the skills to restore them using traditional techniques and appropriate materials including cobbles, clay dabbin and local sandstone.
• Protecting and restoring boundary features such as hedges, mature trees, ditches, sandstone gate stoops and riparian corridors; carrying out works such as earthbank kest restoration, and gapping up and protecting hedges, including management in the Cumberland hedgelaying style.
• Maintaining the landscape structure of fields bounded by stone-faced kest banks on the open coast, hedges with ditches on the reclaimed coastal plain and mainly hedges, often on earthbanks, elsewhere.
• Seeking opportunities to maintain local vernacular styles in new developments and seeking to ensure that the layout of new developments reflects local settlement structure.
• Improving the interpretation of historic sites through both on-site information and new technologies such as web-based resources and mobile technologies.
• Improving access to the coast for walking and, where possible, for cycling and horse riding, providing appropriate access for people of all abilities through the sustainable use of old railway lines, tracks and paths, and encouraging reduced car use. Securing opportunities for the public to enjoy the natural environment through the implementation of the England Coast Path while ensuring appropriate protection of it.
• Ensuring that the promotion of access opportunities educates people about the vulnerability of the historic features in the NCA and encourages visits which avoid any adverse impacts on agricultural management, landscape, habitats and wildlife.