page_title: Peacehaven
section_title: Geography
hierarchical_section_title: Peacehaven / Geography
caption_attribution_description: View of the Chalk Cliffs along the Sussex coast at Peacehaven
context_page_description: Peacehaven is a town and civil parish in the Lewes district of East Sussex, England. It is located above the chalk cliffs of the South Downs approximately six miles east of Brighton city centre, on the A259 road. Its site coincides with the point where the Greenwich meridian crosses the English south coast. Peacehaven is next to Telscombe Cliffs, a later western extension to Peacehaven, which lies within a separate parish and has a separate town council.
context_section_description: Peacehaven is located on fairly flat coastal land which is elevated around 40 to 50 m (131 to 164 ft) above sea level. The pebble beach below the cliffs can be reached by a stairs and concrete driveway and sea walk. There are a number of green spaces along the A259 and the cliffs, one of which is called The Dell. A cinema formerly stood on this site, and now it holds events such as car boot sales, fireworks, fairgrounds, motorhome exhibitions, the Donkey Derby and an annual carnival (though in 2005 the carnival was held on the Joff field located behind the Meridian shopping centre). In the 1950s, the carnival stalls were located on the then vacant land on the NW corner of the South Coast Road (A259) and Dorothy Avenue.
  Neville was influenced by the American grid system of planning. There were originally no "Streets" in Peacehaven; only "Roads" and "Avenues". With very few exceptions, "Roads" ran east to west, and "Avenues" north to south, most forming crossroads where they intersected the South Coast Road (A259). Apart from this road, Roderick Avenue, running roughly up the centre, was the only surfaced road (except for the area of Local Authority housing around Friars Avenue (north) in Peacehaven until the late 1950s, when the process of making-up the roads began. This started in Telscombe Cliffs and worked eastwards. As part of this, many of the Avenues had their junction with the main road blocked off to reduce the number of junctions and crossroads. The town still retains its original "grid" layout (apart from the newer development to the west called Telscombe Cliffs and above Firle Road): rectangular plots of land on both sides of the main road. Aerial photographs from the 30s clearly show the "grid" pattern and, at that time, the scattered nature of the community.
  The parish includes part of the Brighton to Newhaven Cliffs Site of Special Scientific Interest. The cliffs are mainly of geological interest, containing many Santonian and Campanian fossils. The SSSI listing includes flora and fauna biological interest too.
  The Prime meridian is marked by a 3.5 m (11 ft) tall obelisk, commissioned by Charles Neville. It was unveiled on 10 August 1936, and has been relocated twice due to erosion of the cliffs.
caption: The chalk cliffs at Peacehaven
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