Top Threats

Britain's remaining green spaces are under serious pressure from inappropriate development. The countryside is giving way to sprawling housing estates, airports and out-of-town retail centres, all of them driving the expansion of the UK's road network.

Efforts to single out one scheme as "worse" than another are invariably subjective. Is the loss of a large area of greenfield land worse than the destruction of a small but important wildlife habitat? Should we care more about the loss of remote landscape than the paving over of close-to-town green belt?

There are no definitive answers, and the Manuka Club supports groups that campaign constructively for landscape protection wherever they are.

It is clear that local groups can change the direction of national policy if they gain enough support - see the Winning is Possible page for details of some recent successes.

But a huge number of damaging schemes remain in the pipeline. The following developments - in no particular order - have been named by the Manuka Club's expert contacts in transport and waste as amongst the most strategically important campaigns in the UK today.

Road building

A14 Ellington to Fen Ditton - Cambridgeshire

At £1.3 billion, this is the most expensive scheme in the national road-building programme. It is billed as a solution to the large volume of HGVs travelling from the Haven ports to the M1 and M6, but would increase greenhouse gas emissions by over one hundred thousand tonnes a year. 

Local people have complained that the road will generate so much traffic that any reduction in congestion will be cancelled out. Instead, they are calling for improvements to rail freight lines in order to take lorries off the road permanently. 

Bexhill-Hastings Link Road - East Sussex

East Sussex County Council wants to spend £100 million building a new link road along the south coast, through the Coombe Haven Valley - a site of special scientific interest. 

Cheaper, more sustainable options, such as opening a new train station between Bexhill and Hastings, have been put to one side, but local group the Hastings Alliance is determined to save the valley and see the money invested in greener transport instead. 

Kingskerswell Bypass - Devon

This £130 million scheme would route large volumes of traffic through a peaceful part of the Devon countryside, damaging the local environment and diminishing quality of life for those who live nearby.

Instead, local residents organised as the Kingskerswell Alliance want the old railway station reopened, cheaper improvements to some junctions and investment in local bus services to give people travel choices.

Airport expansion

Bristol International Airport - North Somerset 

The owners of Bristol airport want to increase passenger numbers by 60 percent to 10 million per year. North Somerset council approved the plans in 2010, despite receiving over 5,000 objections from individuals and from neighbouring local authorities.

The application has now been referred to central government, which may result in a public inquiry. Local residents are also exploring a legal challenge on the basis that the existing expansion plans are based on outdated aviation policy drawn up under the last Government.

London City Airport

Thousands of people live within earshot of planes landing and taking off from this airport in the Docklands. Newham Council's decision to approve plans increasing London City's capacity to handle 120,000 flights per year has proven unpopular with local residents and neighbouring councils alike.

In June 2010, local group Fight the Flights won permission to challenge the expansion plans by judicial review, on the grounds that the council failed in its duty to consult residents and neighbouring local authorities, and failed to consider the effects of airport expansion on climate change.

Lydd (London Ashford Airport) - Kent

This small airport has some very large expansion plans. Handling just 3,000 passengers per year, Lydd lies in the middle of an internationally recognised nature site and in the shadow of Dungeness nuclear power station. Yet the airport's owner has applied to boost capacity to 2 million passengers per year via a runway extension and new terminal building.  

The expansion has attracted strong local resistance, forcing a public inquiry into the £25 million development plans. 

Waste facilities

Sherwood Forest incinerator - Nottinghamshire  

The notion of building a waste incinerator on a greenfield site in Sherwood Forest was bound to be controversial, and local residents have worked to halt the scheme for more than five years under the banner of People Against Incineration (PAIN).  

Despite the opposition, Nottinghamshire County Council is supportive of the planning application. PAIN recently succeeded in bringing about a public inquiry into the council's decision, with an outcome due in 2011.

Ivybridge incinerator - Devon

Plans for a multi million pound incinerator on the edge of Dartmoor National Park have drawn concern from local people worried about the impacts on local air and water quality. Residents of the nearest town, Ivybridge, have formed a group to oppose plans for the facility, and the local Council received more than 1,000 objections in its first round of consultation.