Contractors have started pulling piles from beneath Worthing Pier. The repair is forecast at £550,000, due to finish by the end of autumn. The pier stays open.

Work on the permanent repair to Worthing Pier has started, and the first piles are out.

Worthing Borough Council confirmed on Thursday 20 August that contractors have removed two support piles, the concrete foundations beneath them, and two more piles that had been broken and taken out earlier. Breaking up the concrete needed jackhammers, and the council apologised to people living nearby who were disturbed by the noise.

The next stage waits on the tide. The council said the team will use September’s spring tides, when the sea goes out far enough to give a decent working window on the beach, to install the foundations for the replacement piles.

The pier stays open while all of this happens.

Timeline of the Worthing Pier repair: storm damage and closure in October 2024, temporary steel support installed and the pier reopened in December 2024, repair plan set out on 3 July 2026 with a £550,000 forecast, two support piles and their foundations removed in August 2026, replacement pile foundations due on September's spring tides, target completion by the end of autumn 2026

Why the pier needed the work

The pier closed without warning in October 2024 after a storm damaged the piles holding up one section, leaving it unsafe for the public. It reopened later that year once engineers had designed and built a temporary steel support structure to sit under the weakened span and carry the load.

That support was always a stopgap. In its update this week the council said the structure is still doing its job now the piles above it have been taken out.

The permanent fix works from below rather than above, which is the decision that changed the price. Rather than lifting off the timber deck and supports to reach the piles, the contractors are driving new piles from the beach, then fitting bull bars and ties to them for extra strength. Once the repair is finished the temporary steel structure will be dismantled and removed.

The council set out the plan on 3 July, and put the numbers in the open:

  • Up to £550,000 is the current forecast cost.
  • £930,000 was the original estimate.
  • 18 months of work with specialist engineers went into designing the solution.
  • Activity was due to begin on site in August and be complete before the end of autumn.

Councillor Caroline Baxter, the leader of Worthing Borough Council, said in July: “When we installed the temporary steel support beneath the pier in December 2024, we said it would give us the time needed to develop a permanent solution. I’m delighted that we’re now able to take that next step and deliver permanent repairs.”

What is actually being repaired

The structure under the deck is older than most people walking over it realise. Worthing Pier is Grade II listed, listed on 30 July 1975 as “The Pier (Including the Pierfoot Pavilion and the Pierhead Pavilion)”. Historic England’s list entry records that it was built in 1860 to 1862 to a design by Robert Rawlinson for J Cliff of Bradford, and that it was 960 feet long.

The neck was widened from 15 feet to 30 feet in 1887 to 1889 and the pierhead enlarged to 105 feet. The list entry describes the deck as 24 spans of longitudinal lattice girders supported by cast iron trestles, carrying timber joists under the wooden decking. The Pierfoot Pavilion at the shore end dates from 1926.

That is what the piles being replaced are holding up.

The pier’s landing stage, used mainly by the town’s fishing community, reopened earlier this summer after its degraded handrails were replaced. The council said some further work there will happen over the coming months when tides allow.

What it means for you

  • The pier is open. Working from beneath the deck at low tide is the whole reason it can stay that way, and there is no closure planned.
  • Expect noise and a fenced working area on the beach around the spring tides in September. Low-tide working means the noisy stages happen when the sea is furthest out, not to a fixed daily timetable.
  • The seafront around the pier is busy with other work too. Our Worthing roadworks and travel page carries the current position on the heat network digs, the groynes and the car park charges that rise on 24 August.
  • The forecast is a forecast. £550,000 is what the council expects to spend, not a settled bill, and the “end of autumn” completion date depends on weather and tides. We will follow it up.

Sources