The purpose of this special issue is to illustrate the role of a sustainable coastal research infrastructure in supporting monitoring, sciences, and management of the coastal marine areas. As such the JERICO-RI research infrastructure is most suitable, gathering 34 partners in Europe with the same overarching objective: to strengthen and enlarge a solid and transparent European network of coastal observatories and to provide an operational service for the timely, continuous, and sustainable delivery of high-quality environmental (physical, biogeochemical, and biological) data and services related to the marine environment in European coastal seas. Six scientific areas are targeted, from the sensor development to the data analysis and the scientific results. These are the following:

1. the pelagic biodiversity with phytoplankton and harmful algal blooms;
2. the benthic biodiversity and habitats;
3. the contaminant transports;
4. the coastal transport and hydrology;
5. the carbonate systems and C cycle; and
6. the coastal operational oceanography and modelling.