Coopers Beach

Coopers Beach in Southampton has earned one of the most reliable track records of any beach in America for sheer quality. "Dr. Beach" — the University of Florida marine scientist Dr. Stephen Leatherman who has published an annual America's Best Beach ranking since 1991 — has placed Coopers Beach in first position on his list four times, and it consistently appears in the top five. The criteria are exacting: Dr. Leatherman measures 50 physical and environmental factors including water quality, wave action, sand quality, absence of litter and development, facilities, and general aesthetics. Coopers Beach scores highest on virtually all of them among Atlantic beaches.

The beach itself is wide, gently sloping, and remarkably clean — a result of Southampton's active maintenance programme and the relatively low density of development along this part of the Long Island south shore. The sand is fine and genuinely white, deriving from the same glacial outwash geology that gives the Hamptons beaches their distinctive color and texture. The water is exceptionally clear for the Atlantic northeast — consistent with the relatively sparse development of the watershed catchment feeding this stretch of coast. The beach runs for approximately 800 metres between two groins, backed by a modest but well-kept bathhouse and facilities pavilion, and fringed by dunes protecting the residential streets behind.

Southampton Village is directly accessible on foot from Coopers Beach (about 10 minutes to the commercial centre on Jobs Lane). The village is one of the most attractive of all the Hamptons communities — less celebrities-and-velvet-rope than the Montauk or East Hampton scenes and more genuinely lived-in: independent bookshops, art galleries, the Parrish Art Museum, quality restaurants, and a Saturday farmers market that serves the year-round community. The adjacent Rogers Memorial Beach and the Shinnecock Hills area offer walking options, and the nearby Shinnecock National Cultural Center provides context for the indigenous history of the land.