My Coast App

After two summers of near-misses exploring the Cornish coast, I have taken on the challenge of developing a public facing app called 'My Coast', with the help of the RNLI, MET Office, South West Water and many others. The app will give coastal & beach users LIVE safety and other useful, verified information to ensure they stay safe and get the best out of their day.

The app will be able to:

• Reduce the number of avoidable deaths and accidents involving rescues on our coastline, by providing live safety information, emergency service push notifications and an emergency 'call for help' button should you get into trouble
• Give information on how busy an area is in real-time, so it's really easy for everyone to avoid crowds and pick somewhere else suitable to go instead
• Capture information relating to visitor flows in popular hotspots and the effect these movements are having on our areas of natural beauty
• Give really useful information about how to travel to where you'd like to go without using a car, eg linking to bus and train timetables, EV charging points, bicycle parking and walking/cycling routes
• Continual maintenance and updating to ensure it remains as the 'go-to' single source of truth
• Be the catalyst for improving connectivity along our coastlines and in rural areas, ensuring our emergency functions can operate even when there is little or no phone reception

Let me explain

I'm a Cornish dairy farmer's daughter. Never a surfer or a huge fan of water sports, however I knew the dangers of the sea and had some fairly hair-raising experiences as a kid to ensure my respect of the water. 

These days I'm a single mum of three beauties, namely Lizzie (10), Morwenna (9) and George (6). Both girls are fairly strong swimmers, but George is a way off being in the water unsupervised, so I tend to find myself standing half way between him in the shallows and the girls on bodyboards in the surf, wishing I had eyes in the back of my head.

The fine line between 'best day ever' and 'wish we hadn't even tried'

Have you ever struggled to work out a sensible plan of attack when heading to the coast with kids and dogs in tow? Welcome to my world. I'm so lucky to live in Cornwall and to be surrounded by the sea and our incredible coastline, but trying to plan a great day out on my own with three smalls is nothing short of a nightmare.

The pictures here are examples of what I would classify as great beach days. The conditions are perfect for the kids to be in the water, the café was open and there weren't huge queues, I got to sit and sunbathe whilst watching the kids having a whale of a time. No screaming, no minor (or major!) injuries, no stress. Heaven.

Unfortunately, days like these have been few and far between for us. I could write a book just on 'classic mum fails when attempting to enjoy the coast', to include everything from weaver fish stings (endless screaming), coin operated toilets and no cash (in the middle of nowhere) to numerous 'near-miss' events involving miscalculation of tides, overwhelming rip currents and lost children both in and out of the water. 

How ideas germinate to eureka moments....

I had an epiphany with thanks to some great friends back in lockdown 2020, that what I really needed was an app that would calculate the conditions for me. So it told me when the tide would cut off the cove at Porthtowan, or when the currents were too strong to let the girls bodyboard at Harlyn Bay. Then I started to wonder what other information would also be useful, like how busy the car park was, whether the café was actually open or not, or where the dog poo bins were (if any!).

It was at this point I realised what a opportunity there was to create a platform for communication of local knowledge to help anyone, visiting anywhere.

So, with no fixed agenda for the immediate future, I decided to put all my energy into making said app a reality. I started by contacting the South West Safety Lead for the RNLI, Steve Instance, who agreed that it would be a water safety game-changer, if we could pull it off. Now I'm a big fan of a project, especially seemingly impossible ones, so I got cracking.

Progress to date....

Twelve months later and with the help and support of hundreds of kind souls, I have a product under development that will be on the App Store & Google Play by the end of July for testing. I'm so excited I could scream!

We are basically taking live feeds of the weather, water conditions and quality, then matching those (with the expert guidance of the RNLI) to the relevant safety parameters for different activities; so people like you and me can say what activity you want to do, what facilities and amenities you need and the app will point you in the right direction of the best locations to go to nearby. Simples. 

I know 'I want doesn't get', but....

I want to know whether or not somewhere is already busy. I want to know whether or not today is a good day to try kayaking with the kids. But I don't really want to have to spend hours searching for this information, as there are already too few hours in the day. So let's put all the useful stuff all in one place, make it easy to understand and make everybody's lives just that little bit less stressful.

So what's the ask?

I need your help. This is a huge project with hundreds of different stakeholders all providing information to link it all into this one platform.

So far I've funded everything either personally, through grant funding and more recently with the help of some hugely appreciated sponsorship from South West Water. 

With the app now in development, we desperately need additional funding and sponsorship to enable us to:

a) Commission the academics at the University of Plymouth to analyse the innovative 'Rip Index' to ensure it's accuracy, which provides us with a live feed of how strong the currents are on any given day (a super useful addition to the MET Office forecasts)

b) Undertake a fully strategised social media/PR/marketing campaign to ensure maximal uptake of the app when launched

c) Get bodies on the ground to verify all information supplied to us via numerous sources, to ensure we don't put anything onto the app that isn't factually correct

d) Run hospitality forums in the three test locations (Perranporth, Porthtowan and Gyllyngvase beach, Falmouth) to ensure local businesses have the opportunity to see the value in being involved in the project

What's in it for YOU?

If you think the app is something that would be useful to you and your friends and family, then please pledge as much as you can afford to help make it a reality. 

In return, I'd like to invite you and your family to join myself, my family and my amazing development team to celebrate the official launch of the app at C Space in Newquay on Friday 29th July 2022 for an evening of food, drink, music, dancing and smiling in a wonderful location just above Towan Beach. 

I'd also love for you to be involved in the app testing this Summer, if you'd like to have the chance to give your feedback and keep up to date with its progress. 

Obviously you don't have to get involved and can simply pledge as you think it's a good idea!

What do the professionals think?

Not sure if it'll take off? Here's what the guys in the know say....

“My Coast is a marvellous app that enables all those who love Cornwall and its stunning coastline to enjoy it informed by the most up to date information to ensure the safety of your family, the presence of local services and a myriad of other information and, most importantly opening up ideas that encourage you to explore. When you know somewhere well you often return time and again to the same much loved places…this app offers up temptation to travel more widely and to open you up to so much that you might otherwise have missed. To say this is much needed is an understatement and I will be using it”

Sir Tim Smit KBE - Founder of The Eden Project & The Lost Gardens of Heligan

"My Coast- it’s such an obvious, essential app, you can’t believe it’s not already out there! Hoping this app will become the ‘go to’ for any family planning a Cornish coastal visit"

Brendon Prince - 5x World Record Paddle Boarder, Founder of the Above Water charity

“My Coast has the potential to become a one stop shop for visitors and residents looking to find relevant and helpful information about Cornwall’s beaches through an accessible, easy to use app. We are delighted to support the platform and are looking forward to working with the My Coast team as the project comes to life”.

Guy Doble - Director of Waste Water Service, Recovery, Treatment and Networks for South West Water