Twyford Down
Encyclopedia
Twyford Down is a small area of ancient chalk downland
lying directly to the southeast of Winchester
, Hampshire
, England
. The down's 144 metres (472.4 ft) summit, known as Deacon Hill, is towards the north-eastern edge of the area which is renowned for its dramatic rolling scenery, ecologically rich grassland and as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). It is situated at the western extremity of the South Downs National Park
, having previously been designated as part of the East Hampshire AONB
(Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty).
In 1994 a highly controversial road building project was—despite vigorous objection from many quarters—completed and a new 2 miles (3.2 km) stretch of the M3 motorway was created, running through a significant section of the down, which was excavated and removed to create a deep cutting.
had been a traffic bottleneck for many years as several major routes passed through the historic city centre, including the A31
, A33
and A34, as well as smaller routes like the A272
. In the 1930s, a by-pass had been built to the east of the city, passing immediately west of St. Catherine's Hill
. Construction of this had been controversial as it affected the Itchen Valley and offered only a partial solution to congestion, with some people calling instead for a by-pass to the north and west of Winchester. With increasing traffic, the by-pass itself became a bottleneck, particularly at its junction with the A333 Portsmouth Road. Eventually it became the last missing link in the M3 motorway between London and Southampton.
The Ministry of Transport
(MoT) had trouble purchasing the land required to complete the route past Winchester. The land required, east of the city on Twyford Down, was owned by Winchester College
, which refused to sell the land to the government because part was a water meadow. The desired route, however, had been chosen to avoid St. Catherine's Hill
, an ancient hill fort
. Proposals were made for a tunnel through Twyford Down, but the estimated cost for this was £
75 million more than the estimated cost for a cutting, and the government dismissed the plans. The final route chosen ran through important chalk grassland habitat
, and 1.91 hectares (4.7 acre) of a Site of Special Scientific Interest
(SSSI) were lost. In 1990, a link between Southampton and the southern end of Twyford Down was completed and soon afterwards work began on clearing the route across the down.
For 20 years, a coalition led by local businessman David Croker
had been trying to save Tywford Down. Environmental organisations including Greenpeace
and Friends of the Earth
, took the by-now renamed Department for Transport to the High Court, stating that the road was against the government's own environmental protection laws. The case failed, but European Union
Commissioner for the Environment Carlo Ripa de Meana looked into the case and ordered the project be stopped because he found that it did violate British and European laws.
In 1989, the Conservative government published its Roads for Prosperity
White Paper
detailing 500 road schemes billed as “The biggest road-building programme since the Romans” with a price-tag of £23 billion at 1989 prices (equivalent to about £40 billion today).
In December 1991, Twyford Down became the site of the UK's first road protest camp when environmentalists, including members of Dongas
and Earth First!
, gathered to hinder work. After a year this first camp was evicted on Yellow Wednesday, named after the uniforms of the Group4 security guards who performed the eviction in December 1992.
Resistance to the road intensified and Earth First! set up a new protest camp nearby in Plague Pits Valley and continued to obstruct the work both on the water meadows and up on the Down itself. In addition to many direct action
s, there was a mass trespass in which over 5000 people attended the protests and occupations, and six people were sent to prison for some weeks for defying an earlier injunction not to enter the site.
was planted with 7.2 hectares (17.8 acre) of species-rich grassland under the supervision and monitoring of The Institute of Terrestrial Ecology.
In 1994, a government committee concluded that building more roads encourages more traffic and that the way to ease congestion and pollution was to take measures to control car use rather than accommodate more. When Labour came to power in 1997, most of the road schemes were suspended.
In 2000, campaigners mounted legal action to preserve an area of grassland created on the route of the old A33 Winchester bypass in mitigation of the land lost to the motorway which was threatened by a Park and Ride
site. The legal action failed and the campaigners claimed that they had been betrayed for a second time. Land was provided elsewhere in mitigation.
In 2004, Winchester Cathedral
received £86,000 from the Highways Agency in compensation for increased traffic noise from the M3. The Rev. Michael Till explained that "the noise comes beaming straight across The Close. It does change life having a perpetual background noise".
Also in 2004, veterans of a Twyford Down protest threatened a new campaign of direct action in response to 200 new road-building proposals in the government's recently unveiled ten-year transport plan and one of them went on to found Road Block in 2005, which became part of the Campaign for Better Transport (UK) in 2007.
Downland
A downland is an area of open chalk hills. This term is especially used to describe the chalk countryside in southern England. Areas of downland are often referred to as Downs....
lying directly to the southeast of Winchester
Winchester
Winchester is a historic cathedral city and former capital city of England. It is the county town of Hampshire, in South East England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government district, and is located at the western end of the South Downs, along the course of...
, Hampshire
Hampshire
Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England in the United Kingdom. The county town of Hampshire is Winchester, a historic cathedral city that was once the capital of England. Hampshire is notable for housing the original birthplaces of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. The down's 144 metres (472.4 ft) summit, known as Deacon Hill, is towards the north-eastern edge of the area which is renowned for its dramatic rolling scenery, ecologically rich grassland and as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). It is situated at the western extremity of the South Downs National Park
South Downs National Park
The South Downs National Park is England's newest National Park, having become fully operational on 1 April 2011. The park, covering an area of in southern England, stretches for from Winchester in the west to Eastbourne in the east through the counties of Hampshire, West Sussex and East Sussex...
, having previously been designated as part of the East Hampshire AONB
East Hampshire AONB
East Hampshire Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in England was designated in 1962. The designation was revoked in March 2010, together with the neighbouring Sussex Downs AONB, upon the establishment of the South Downs National Park. The southern part of the area is mainly rolling chalk...
(Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty).
In 1994 a highly controversial road building project was—despite vigorous objection from many quarters—completed and a new 2 miles (3.2 km) stretch of the M3 motorway was created, running through a significant section of the down, which was excavated and removed to create a deep cutting.
The M3 motorway extension
WinchesterWinchester
Winchester is a historic cathedral city and former capital city of England. It is the county town of Hampshire, in South East England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government district, and is located at the western end of the South Downs, along the course of...
had been a traffic bottleneck for many years as several major routes passed through the historic city centre, including the A31
A31 road
The A31 is a major trunk road in southern England that runs from Guildford in Surrey to Bere Regis in Dorset.-Route of road:The road begins in the centre of Guildford, meeting the A3 road before running south west along the Hog's Back. It continues past Farnham, Alton and New Alresford before...
, A33
A33 road
The A33 is a major road in England. The road formerly ran from Reading to Southampton, but now consists of three disjoint sections:*Reading to Basingstoke*The A30 road south of Basingstoke to just north of Winchester...
and A34, as well as smaller routes like the A272
A272 road
The A272 is a road in South-East England. It follows an approximate East-West route from near Heathfield, East Sussex to the city of Winchester, Hampshire. It has achieved somewhat unlikely fame in recent years by being the subject of a book by the Dutch author, Pieter Boogaart...
. In the 1930s, a by-pass had been built to the east of the city, passing immediately west of St. Catherine's Hill
St. Catherine's Hill, Hampshire
St. Catherine's Hill is a small but dramatic chalk hill to the south east of Winchester in Hampshire, England. Rising steeply some from the water meadows of the River Itchen, the summit of the hill at provides a fine view over Winchester....
. Construction of this had been controversial as it affected the Itchen Valley and offered only a partial solution to congestion, with some people calling instead for a by-pass to the north and west of Winchester. With increasing traffic, the by-pass itself became a bottleneck, particularly at its junction with the A333 Portsmouth Road. Eventually it became the last missing link in the M3 motorway between London and Southampton.
The Ministry of Transport
Department for Transport
In the United Kingdom, the Department for Transport is the government department responsible for the English transport network and a limited number of transport matters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland which are not devolved...
(MoT) had trouble purchasing the land required to complete the route past Winchester. The land required, east of the city on Twyford Down, was owned by Winchester College
Winchester College
Winchester College is an independent school for boys in the British public school tradition, situated in Winchester, Hampshire, the former capital of England. It has existed in its present location for over 600 years and claims the longest unbroken history of any school in England...
, which refused to sell the land to the government because part was a water meadow. The desired route, however, had been chosen to avoid St. Catherine's Hill
St. Catherine's Hill, Hampshire
St. Catherine's Hill is a small but dramatic chalk hill to the south east of Winchester in Hampshire, England. Rising steeply some from the water meadows of the River Itchen, the summit of the hill at provides a fine view over Winchester....
, an ancient hill fort
Hill fort
A hill fort is a type of earthworks used as a fortified refuge or defended settlement, located to exploit a rise in elevation for defensive advantage. They are typically European and of the Bronze and Iron Ages. Some were used in the post-Roman period...
. Proposals were made for a tunnel through Twyford Down, but the estimated cost for this was £
Pound sterling
The pound sterling , commonly called the pound, is the official currency of the United Kingdom, its Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, British Antarctic Territory and Tristan da Cunha. It is subdivided into 100 pence...
75 million more than the estimated cost for a cutting, and the government dismissed the plans. The final route chosen ran through important chalk grassland habitat
Habitat (ecology)
A habitat is an ecological or environmental area that is inhabited by a particular species of animal, plant or other type of organism...
, and 1.91 hectares (4.7 acre) of a Site of Special Scientific Interest
Site of Special Scientific Interest
A Site of Special Scientific Interest is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom. SSSIs are the basic building block of site-based nature conservation legislation and most other legal nature/geological conservation designations in Great Britain are based upon...
(SSSI) were lost. In 1990, a link between Southampton and the southern end of Twyford Down was completed and soon afterwards work began on clearing the route across the down.
Protest
David Croker
David Croker was a key participant in the public enquiries which preceded the building of the major stretch of the M3 motorway around Winchester. He came to national prominence as a vigorous and eloquent leader of the...
had been trying to save Tywford Down. Environmental organisations including Greenpeace
Greenpeace
Greenpeace is a non-governmental environmental organization with offices in over forty countries and with an international coordinating body in Amsterdam, The Netherlands...
and Friends of the Earth
Friends of the Earth
Friends of the Earth International is an international network of environmental organizations in 76 countries.FOEI is assisted by a small secretariat which provides support for the network and its agreed major campaigns...
, took the by-now renamed Department for Transport to the High Court, stating that the road was against the government's own environmental protection laws. The case failed, but European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
Commissioner for the Environment Carlo Ripa de Meana looked into the case and ordered the project be stopped because he found that it did violate British and European laws.
In 1989, the Conservative government published its Roads for Prosperity
Roads for Prosperity
Roads for Prosperity was a controversial white paper published by the Conservative UK Government in 1989 detailing the 'largest road building program for the UK since the Romans' produced in response to rapid increases in car ownership and use over the previous decade...
White Paper
White paper
A white paper is an authoritative report or guide that helps solve a problem. White papers are used to educate readers and help people make decisions, and are often requested and used in politics, policy, business, and technical fields. In commercial use, the term has also come to refer to...
detailing 500 road schemes billed as “The biggest road-building programme since the Romans” with a price-tag of £23 billion at 1989 prices (equivalent to about £40 billion today).
In December 1991, Twyford Down became the site of the UK's first road protest camp when environmentalists, including members of Dongas
Dongas road protest group
The Dongas Tribe was a collection of UK road protesters and travellers in England originally noted for their occupation of Twyford Down outside Winchester, Hampshire...
and Earth First!
Earth First!
Earth First! is a radical environmental advocacy group that emerged in the Southwestern United States in 1979. It was co-founded on April 4th, 1980 by Dave Foreman, Mike Roselle, Howie Wolke, and less directly, Bart Koehler and Ron Kezar....
, gathered to hinder work. After a year this first camp was evicted on Yellow Wednesday, named after the uniforms of the Group4 security guards who performed the eviction in December 1992.
Resistance to the road intensified and Earth First! set up a new protest camp nearby in Plague Pits Valley and continued to obstruct the work both on the water meadows and up on the Down itself. In addition to many direct action
Direct action
Direct action is activity undertaken by individuals, groups, or governments to achieve political, economic, or social goals outside of normal social/political channels. This can include nonviolent and violent activities which target persons, groups, or property deemed offensive to the direct action...
s, there was a mass trespass in which over 5000 people attended the protests and occupations, and six people were sent to prison for some weeks for defying an earlier injunction not to enter the site.
Outcome
The motorway section that was eventually constructed through Twyford Down completed the route of the M3 motorway. Prior to its completion, traffic travelling from nearby Southampton and Portsmouth (major ferry ports) and from farther west to London and the north had to exit the truncated M3 and travel on the heavily congested 1930s Winchester Bypass. Once round this bypass, traffic could either rejoin the M3 in order to proceed toward London or join the A34 road. Completion of the link in 1994 removed the traffic from the existing Winchester Bypass, allowing its closure and significantly reduced heavy traffic volumes from the village of Twyford. To redress the loss of 1.91 hectares (4.7 acre) of SSSI land, the old route of the A33 roadA33 road
The A33 is a major road in England. The road formerly ran from Reading to Southampton, but now consists of three disjoint sections:*Reading to Basingstoke*The A30 road south of Basingstoke to just north of Winchester...
was planted with 7.2 hectares (17.8 acre) of species-rich grassland under the supervision and monitoring of The Institute of Terrestrial Ecology.
In 1994, a government committee concluded that building more roads encourages more traffic and that the way to ease congestion and pollution was to take measures to control car use rather than accommodate more. When Labour came to power in 1997, most of the road schemes were suspended.
In 2000, campaigners mounted legal action to preserve an area of grassland created on the route of the old A33 Winchester bypass in mitigation of the land lost to the motorway which was threatened by a Park and Ride
Park and ride
Park and ride facilities are car parks with connections to public transport that allow commuters and other people wishing to travel into city centres to leave their vehicles and transfer to a bus, rail system , or carpool for the rest of their trip...
site. The legal action failed and the campaigners claimed that they had been betrayed for a second time. Land was provided elsewhere in mitigation.
In 2004, Winchester Cathedral
Winchester Cathedral
Winchester Cathedral at Winchester in Hampshire is one of the largest cathedrals in England, with the longest nave and overall length of any Gothic cathedral in Europe...
received £86,000 from the Highways Agency in compensation for increased traffic noise from the M3. The Rev. Michael Till explained that "the noise comes beaming straight across The Close. It does change life having a perpetual background noise".
Also in 2004, veterans of a Twyford Down protest threatened a new campaign of direct action in response to 200 new road-building proposals in the government's recently unveiled ten-year transport plan and one of them went on to found Road Block in 2005, which became part of the Campaign for Better Transport (UK) in 2007.
See also
- Emma MustEmma MustEmma Must is an English environmental activist, teacher, and poet who previously worked as a librarian. She was awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize in 1995 for her efforts on land protection, particularly her influence on British road building policies. She brought attention to Twyford...
- Environmental direct action in the United KingdomEnvironmental direct action in the United KingdomThe environmental direct action movement in the United Kingdom started in 1991 with the forming of the first UK Earth First! group. The movement rapidly grew to include road protest camps, airport camps, anti-GMO actions, electricity generators, and quarry actions.-History:The Earth First! movement...
- Newbury bypassNewbury bypassThe Newbury bypass, officially known as The Winchester-Preston Trunk Road , is a stretch of dual carriageway road which bypasses the town of Newbury in Berkshire, England...
- Road protest in the United Kingdom
External links
- Photo gallery of mass trespass from Urban75Urban75Urban75 is a website and messageboard based in Brixton, England. It was founded in 1995 and includes various e-zine content, as well as bulletin boards. The site was founded and is currently run by Mike Slocombe.-History:Urban75 initially originated from a football comic that started in 1991...
- BBC Hampshire webpage containing summary of Twyford Down's historical and contemporary significance.
- British Library page with short relevant section under heading of Dreamers and Dissenters — Treehouse and Tunnels.
- Twyford Parish Council Traffic Committee's background on traffic situation in the town of Twyford..