St Mary's Bay (Devon)
St Mary's Bay is a secluded cove not far from the town of Brixham. The beach is mostly sandy with some shingle and rocks. Located just south of Berry Head, the beach lies on the popular 22-mile stretch of coastline known as the English Riviera. The beach is a popular spot for swimming and snorkelling, although there is no lifeguard service.
St Mary’s is best reached from the pay and display car park at Sharkham Point, at the end of St Mary’s Road, along a path and some steep steps. This can make disabled access quite difficult. Sharkham Point is the headland to the south of the beach. From here there are excellent views of St Mary’s Bay and the heritage coast beyond. There are further panoramic views from the coastal path that passes above the beach.
Overflow locations
The map below shows the locations of the storm overflows that have the potential to impact water quality at this bathing water.
The map shows whether or not a storm overflow is currently active, the time and duration of the last spill at that location, and our investment commitments that are specific to that overflow.
St Mary's Bay (Devon) storm overflow map
Water quality sample results
The graphs below show the significant reduction in harmful bacteria in the Environment Agency’s (EA) water samples since the 1990s. E. coli and Intestinal Enterococci exist in all open water - they are found in human and animal poo, and get into the water via sewage spills, road drainage, agricultural livestock, or wildlife and birds. The EA uses the levels of these bacteria to decide whether to award this beach bathing water status.
2025-2030 investment programme
As part of our improvement plan to 2030 we have identified improvements to all bathing beaches in the region where a storm overflow currently discharges, delivering improvements to all impacted bathing waters by 2030*.
The 2025-2030 investment programme is currently being scoped out. If you’re a community group or part of a local network and would like to have your say see ‘Your Beach, Your Say, Our Investment’.
*Amounts earmarked for investment may change dependent on the final design of the optimal solution and costings provided by our supply chain.
4 year overflow spill information
The data shown in the table below is the reported annual total spill number for each overflow which has been identified by the EA for this bathing water.
The assignment of an overflow to the bathing water does not always mean an impact will occur, it can be dependent on a number of factors such as tidal state and weather conditions. Sometimes it has been allocated just for investigation purposes and has no impact at all.
All data collected goes through vigorous quality assurance processes before being included in the counts. Sometimes debris can trigger false spills to be recorded, resulting in potentially higher than actual spill numbers.
Number of spills
| Point of overflow | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bolton Street storm overflow, Brixham | 71 | 49 | 48 | 79 |
More about what we're doing
The beach profiles were created in line with information provided by our partners, Environment Agency, RNLI, Keep Britain Tidy, MCS - Beach Guide and British Beaches.