Beaches across the Algarve and the Alentejo coast will soon display maps at their entrances showing clearly delineated concession areas, access routes, safety zones, and public free-use areas, in a move aimed at ending longstanding confusion over where beachgoers can and cannot set up parasols.
According to the Minister for the Environment and Energy, Maria da Graça Carvalho, the initiative is intended to make the layout of each beach clearer, particularly with regard to the placement of umbrellas.
"It may happen that, on a particular beach, the concession area and the safety strip, which falls under the responsibility of the mayor, extend all the way to the waterline. It depends on the beach, so this needs to be clearly shown on the map displayed at the entrance," the minister said.
Carvalho was speaking after a meeting with the mayors of the Algarve municipalities of Vila Real de Santo António, Castro Marim, Faro, Lagos, and Vila do Bispo, as well as representatives from the Alentejo municipality of Grândola.
The meeting, which also brought together the National Association of Portuguese Municipalities (ANMP), the Algarve Intermunicipal Community (AMAL) and the Portuguese Environment Agency (APA), resulted in an agreement to install "a clearly visible map at every beach entrance" identifying concession areas, pedestrian access routes, safety zones, and unrestricted public areas.
This comes as the Maritime Police were called to two beaches in the Algarve this weekend alone to clarify the rules on beach umbrellas placed in front of concession-operated areas. Both interventions were aimed at explaining the regulations to beachgoers, and no phyiscal confrontations or incidents were reported.
The first case took place at Praia Verde, in the municipality of Castro Marim, where umbrellas had been set up in front of a licensed beach concession. Officers approached several families and explained that any umbrellas erected upright in this area had to be lowered or tilted so that they touched the sand, in accordance with the applicable rules.
A second incident occurred at Praia de Altura, also in Castro Marim. On this occasion, lifeguards reportedly prevented beachgoers from setting up umbrellas in the area directly in front of the concession, prompting the Maritime Police to attend the scene and provide further clarification.
The maps, to be drawn up by the respective local authorities, subject to the opinion of the Maritime Authority and the APA, will not change any existing regulations, which stipulate that concession areas may occupy no more than 30% of a beach's usable area or 50% of its seafront frontage. Nor will the scheme be legally binding; rather, it will be introduced as a recommendation, which, according to the minister, received unanimous backing.
Each map will also have to reflect the specific geography and morphology of the individual beach. APA president José Pimenta Machado has already scheduled a meeting with the newly appointed Director-General of the Maritime Authority "to explain all these measures".
The minister stressed that the concerns prompting the initiative are largely confined to a handful of beaches in these Algarve municipalities and in Grândola, meaning that the maps will only be introduced in those locations.
"There have been no such issues on beaches in northern or central Portugal. The mayors from the municipalities where concerns have arisen attended the meeting, and they agreed to produce these maps because they believe they are a good way of clarifying how each beach is organised," she added.
Source: LUSA
Photo credit: CM
