Archived press release

Hastings alliance launched

19 March 2001

Leading environment and transport organisations joined together today to fight plans to build two bypasses around Hastings. Backed by a combined membership of almost 2 million [1] the Hastings Alliance is calling on Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott, to refuse permission for the schemes to go ahead.

The Hastings Alliance is made up of national organisations including Friends of the Earth, the Council for the Protection of Rural England, Transport 2000, WWF, RSPB, The Wildlife Trusts,the Council for National Parks and a number of local community and conservation groups [1].

The Hastings Alliance has written to Mr Prescott, who will take the final decision, setting out reasons why the bypasses shouldn't be built:

• They would conflict with Government policy protecting Britain's most beautiful landscape and best wildlife sites [2]. The roads are also opposed by both English Nature and the Countryside Agency;

• They would increase traffic in surrounding towns and increase pressure for more road-building in the Brede Valley and the new South Downs National Park;

• They could have a negative impact on employment. A consultant's study reported that building the bypasses and developing an out of town business park near Bexhill could lead to 300 jobs being lost in Hastings [3];

• The consultants' study did not properly consider local transport solutions despite the fact that 95% of traffic is local.

The Alliance is also concerned that a decision to go ahead and build the bypasses would prejudice the outcome of the South Coast multi-modal study, which is due to report next year

Gillian Bargery, joint co-ordinator of the Hastings Alliance, said:
"These destructive bypasses aren't the answer to Hastings traffic problems. The schemes are another piece in the jigsaw towards a south coast motorway. They will attract traffic from the M25, threatening conservation towns like Rye and the new South Downs National Park with more congestion and road building. The £130 million earmarked for these roads would be far better spent on local transport and regeneration initiatives to bring Hastings the revitalisation it so badly needs.”

Tony Bosworth, Friends of the Earth's Transport Campaigner, said:
“Labour promised it would be the greenest Government ever. So far it's failed to live up to this pledge.The Hastings bypasses are another test of this commitment. Will Mr Prescott protect our best landscapes and wildlife sites from road building, as he promised, or cave in to the road builders?”

Steve Gilbert, RSPB Senior Conservation Officer for South East England, said:
"The Hastings bypasses will cause damage and disturbance to designated SSSIs, which are nationally important wildlife sites, as well as harming ancient woodlands and causing wider,unacceptable harm to the environment. We urge the Secretary of State to find alternative solutions for Hastings."

NOTES TO EDITORS
[1] The Hastings Alliance is made up of the following groups with a combined membership of over 1,820,000.

National
Council for National Parks (CNP)
Council for the Protection of Rural England (CPRE)
Friends of the Earth England, Wales &Northern Ireland
Royal Society for the Protection of Birds(RSPB)
The Wildlife Trusts
Transport 2000
Worldwide Fund for Nature - UK

Hastings, Kent & Sussex
A27 Action Group
Brighton & Hove & Mid-Sussex Friends of the Earth
CPRE _ Sussex Branch
East Sussex Transport 2000
Friends of the Brede Valley
Hastings & Rother Childcare Campaign
Hastings Friends of the Earth
Hastings Open Technology
Lewes Friends of the Earth
RailFirst
Rother Environment Group
Sussex SERA
Sussex Wildlife Trust
Wishing Tree Residents Association

[2] The Bexhill and Hastings Western Bypass and the Hastings Eastern Bypass would create a new 21 km road around Hastings and Bexhill, nearly all of this would be dual carriageway, damaging three SSSIs _ Pevensey Levels, (also a Ramsar site), Combe Haven and Marline Valley Woods - and the High Weald AONB. The Access to Hastings report also said that the environmental impacts would conflict with Government policy. Further information is available in a briefing ' The Hastings bypasses - a destructive diversion' available from Friends of the Earth.

[3] The Access to Hastings study concluded that building the bypasses along with the development of the out of town business park north of Bexhill could lead to a loss of 300 jobs as businesses moved out to the new park, leaving behind even more empty properties in central Hastings. They also expressed concern about how those people these developments were supposed to help would actually access them.

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Published by Friends of the Earth Trust