Transport Futures East Sussex/Campaign for Better Transport / Hastings Alliance

There has been a long time lapse since the last update – apologies for that. This is a quick update and will be followed in the next two weeks with latest news and also comment on transport issues in Hastings, Bexhill and the wider county.

The saga of the BHLR continues. With the county council website behind events and still displaying information on the 10k running event for the 20^th September, we have since seen elsewhere in the news revelations of delay, apologies, blame and staggering multi-million pound costs increases.

The latest information we have is:

• the road will open on or around the 2^nd November
• there will be a new bus service operating between Bexhill – Tesco – Hastings. It will be an extension of the current 21 route with three vehicles available
• bus lane construction along the existing A259 will begin in February 2016

All of this is, of course, subject to confirmation and possible revision, and  no details of frequencies of the proposed bus service were given. Will it happen on November 2nd?

The recent televised apology for the delay made by county council leader Cllr Keith Glazier was tempered by an assertion that ‘protestor action’ had been a significant cause. It may have delayed construction by a few weeks, but the years of delay are due to the mis-management of the scheme, with a gap of three years (2004-7) due to legally required consultation meetings with government ‘environment protection bodies’ to devise measures to mitigate (make ‘less worse’) inevitable environmental damage.

The meetings must have been less than effective, because all three government Statutory Environmental Bodies ( SEBs: Environment Agency, Natural England and English Heritage) raised serious doubts about the quality of the planning application for the Link Road scheme when it was submitted to the county’s own planning committee: the first two objected formally and the third raised questions about the size of the budget to conserve for the nation the archeological treasures already known, and those judged almost certainly  present – but yet unknown – in the Combe Haven valleys.

It took until 2009 to determine the planning application and then came the Public Inquiry late in that year. The inspector’s report didn’t appear for a further two years.

The government’s ranking of the Link Road in the ‘value for money’ league table for all English local authority road schemes was bottom of 23 and the worst for CO2 emissions: the environmental impact of the road was calculated by the Department for Transport as incurring a cost of between £77m and £123m. Nevertheless, our ‘prudent’ austerity conscious chancellor, George Osborne, ignored that, as well as the Department for Transport analysis that the jobs claimed to follow the road were grossly inflated by a factor of 3.5, and awarded East Sussex County Council £56m. Local taxpayers have been and are liable for the continuing cost overruns with the bill now standing at £65m.

See this link to the published Observer letter of 28^th August, 2015:

Council is to blame for delays – Hastings and St. Leonards Observer

While the Observers published our concerns over the latest £4.4m cost increase:

The appetite for further road building goes on and shows no sign of abating: valued accessible, attractive and ecologically important countryside on the urban fringe is under threat of insensitive and inappropriate development. The nature of that development is highly likely to be ‘car dependent’ and therefore unsustainable and unhealthy, ignoring the needs of the next generation. Alternatives to that failed model of planning have been tried and tested in other locations and shown to deliver a better quality of life: nothing less is acceptable. The Queensway Gateway Road – recently quashed after a High Court action for its failure to properly consider air quality infringements, will be back before the Hastings Borough planning committee before long (objection advice  here). While the Bexhill Northern Access Road planning application has been lodged with Rother District Council. That unnecessary scheme would have major negative environmental impacts on presently quiet rural areas bordering Bexhill and Sidley

We believe that this poses serious problems for quality of the urban developments that will certainly follow. Details from the Seachange development company  website can be seen here. Objections may still be made to Rother District Council (Planning Application: RR/2015/2260/P)

This post concludes with two images taken on 6th September of the formerly intimate, tranquil Decoy Pond Stream Valley showing the BHLR separating Decoy Pond Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) and Little Bog Wood (left of the road site). Silent no more, Little Bog wood is classified as ‘Ancient’ and along with Decoy Pond Wood is visible on maps from the 1700s but existed in medieval times. 

Decoy Pond Stream Valley, September 2015

SUSTAINABLE TRANSPORT NEWS UPDATE

Bexhill to Hastings Link Road (BHLR) ‘Complementary Measures’ – Offsetting Environmental Destruction – Real Time Bus Information – Access to Hospital, or not – Glyne Gap Station – Bus Service Cuts – Challenging £multi-million South Coast Road Building:Launch of SCATE (South Coast Alliance for Transport and the Environment).

 A SINGULAR FOCUS ON THE PRIVATE CAR

Car users can happily rehearse how they will make use of the Link Road from day one of opening in May 2015 (current ESCC prediction) – maybe doing new journeys, or switching back to their cars from sustainable, healthy alternatives. Those without access to a car, are unable to drive, or who choose not to, can only guess at the promised improvements to alternatives to the car. These were always described by East Sussex County Council (ESCC) as ‘complementary’ to the Link Road. Remember, alternatives were never fully examined: there was a resolute refusal to do so. But what? When? Where?

In our view there should be advance publicity around this issue, and a prospect of delivery of ‘high quality’ healthy and sustainable transport coinciding with opening of the Link Road rather than a confused picture of what to expect, and a ‘managed decline’ in bus services now offered through impending cuts.

It is grossly unfair that after 14 years of planning the road, there is almost complete silence on the nature of those ‘complementary measures’ we were led to expect, and what exactly non-car users can look forward to as the Link Road opens. This group of the electorate – plus young people – clearly matter less than habitual car drivers. Time for an urgent dialogue between ESCC and Stagecoach – it might be fruitful.

We have formally asked ESCC to hold exhibitions showing what will be in place on day one of Link Road opening for non-car users. We have heard nothing. A failure to set in place high quality alternatives to the car at that point in time will simply promote the ‘car habit’ and increase traffic congestion, making it much harder to promote or achieve a high take-up of ‘active travel’ – walking, cycling and public transport. This has serious implications for public health and doesn’t comply with ESCC policy, or health policies in general. Once again, it seems that alternatives will lag behind provision for the car, struggling to play catch-up.

PUBLIC TRANSPORT MATTERS – BEXHILL, HASTINGS AND THE WIDER COUNTY

Sure does – but what and where are the plans?

To borrow a phrase, here is a list of the known unknowns:

The bus service to The Conquest from Bexhill may, or may not run on the Link Road. The last we heard, it would run to Tescos where passengers would need to change for the Conquest. Good for the supermarket, but not for those wishing to get to and from the hospital. Evenings, Sundays and Bank Holidays would be excluded. The proposed frequency is unknown.

Eastbourne, Hastings, Bexhill

The wider issue around access from communities to their local hospital, or newly reallocated clinical services, is also unresolved, with Eastbourne District General Hospital (DGH) better connected to its local communities than is Hastings, but no improvement in sight for public transport access to either hospital from their more distant ‘catchments’ eg Hastings Conquest from Hailsham/Eastbourne, or DGH from Bexhill/Hastings. How needs of patients, visitors and staff will be met is unknown. There has been no forward planning, over recent years, simply never ending car park extensions which generate more traffic and undermine the bus market and make walking and cycling unpleasant. It’s crazy!

Those with access to a car are fine. But a taxi from one to the other costs £34. There is not a comprehensive bus service – and there are no signs of one appearing. The Royal Sussex in Brighton offers a good practice example for bus access until late evening, should anyone be interested – and they should be.

Real Time Passenger Information

Funding for Real Time Passenger Information signs (RTPI) intended for Hastings and Bexhill – indicating how long until the next bus arrives – was a casualty of funding the Link Road. These signs have long been in operation in Brighton, including inside the station  where people can clearly see what buses are due at stops outside the station.

BRIGHTON – OFF TRAIN – ONTO BUS

Government funding for these was withheld because ESCC had received millions of pounds for the Link Road. ESCC are going to provide the signs eventually but there is confusion over how many, and where they’ll be. We heard recently that they would not be provided at Hastings Station/Bus Interchange. Clearly, at that location they would be welcome. Inside hospital foyers and the FE colleges in Bexhill and Hastings, and the university would be other obvious locations. Then ideally there would be displays at bus stops over the wider area, including Battle and Rye (and Heathfield and Hailsham). At present, there is no information about information. Public transport works better with clear and prominent information displays but the installation of the displays mentioned has got off to a disastrous start in East Sussex coastal towns. This, plus open talk of cuts to come, does nothing for public confidence in the bus service, and relegates the status of the bus. It’s a subliminal advert for the car.

Glyne Gap Station/Packed and Inadequate Trains

We wait, and wait, for a decision from the Planning Inspectorate on the controversial proposal from Rother District and East Sussex County Council to remove a plan for new station at Glyne Gap (Ravenside) from Rother District Plan and the County’s Local Transport Plan 3. We objected to the local authorities’ proposal  and campaigned hard for its retention and funded a study which showed that the proposals to ‘delete’ the station plan and the £30,000 report on which it was based were flawed. The station would serve the large traffic generating retail park at Ravenside on the A259, the FE college nearby and local residents. We need a new station. We need more trains!

2 CAR ASHFORD BRIGHTON SERVICE – SIMPLY INADEQUATE/GLYNE GAP DEMO

MAKING THE IMPACT OF THE LINK ROAD LESS WORSE

One condition placed on funding approval for ESCC’s Link Road was a requirement to enhance a habitat in the ‘Brede Hastings area’ to offset loss of habitat in Combe Haven. The work will cost £250,000.

The habitat is ‘wet woodland and grassland’. It may well be a pathetic attempt to make up for the wreckage in Decoy Stream valley – completely ruined now – and set to be further degraded when the traffic roars through what was a beautiful, tranquil, intimate, steep sided valley. If an intention is that those who rue its loss may experience something in the area of Brede/Hastings to make up for it – which is very doubtful and more likely impossible – then accessibility is an issue. It should be equally accessible to the ‘sacrificed site’, and accessible to all.

TREES ALONG DECOY STREAM, MEADOW BEHIND/GREYLAG GOOSE BY ‘LITTLE BOG ANCIENT WOODLAND/ TODAY’S SCENE OF THE DECOY STREAM VALLEY

Where is it? How may people get there? It won’t be easily walkable from Bexhill/Hastings and if there is a bus there’ll be a cost. Even if there’s a bus now, current plans to cut services may remove the service. (See below).

ESCC won’t give us a grid reference or accessibility information (requested twice). Worryingly, according to Secretary of State for the Environment, Owen Paterson, MP, offsetting is acceptable if the offset site is ‘up to an hour’s car drive away’. That’s both dismissive and ignorant.

PROPOSED CUTS TO SUPPORTED BUS SERVICES.

An ESCC consultation on proposed cuts is about to be launched (July 7^th). It will run for 12 weeks which unhelpfully coincides with school holidays – and summer holidays for all. The report to Cabinet – including proposed cuts (last three pages) is available via this link: Item 6 (opens new window)

The consultation can be accessed via the link below:

What do you think about these suggested changes to buses? Individuals

In due course we will comment on the proposals on this website and already, others have raised concerns too. Here is a link to ‘Travelman’ website with appropriate comments and useful information. www.travelloglewes.co.uk

Hastings – including links to the Conquest Hospital – is particularly badly hit  by the cuts on weekdays, and on Sundays, for those wishing to access some of the best walking country in the south-east, there may be no buses at all. The ‘honeypot’ of Bodiam Castle will be inaccessible by public transport, along with the adjacent heritage railway.

BELOW:  HASTINGS – BODIAM – HAWKHURST SUNDAY SERVICES MAY BE SCRAPPED. Currently there are four buses each way on Sundays and Bank Holidays.

Hastings Country Park, Fairlight, Winchelsea Beach, Rye and Northiam could lose their Sunday buses too. We note that the National Trust is Committed to reducing the impact of traffic on its properties and the countryside in general, and maximising access by public transport, walking and cycling. The cuts won’t help.

If you wish to make comments on the proposed cuts directly to CBT East Sussex, feel free to do so by e-mail to: derrick.coffee@talk21.com I will incorporate comments in a response. If you have time to submit a response that would be great.

FURTHER MULTI-MILLION POUND ROAD PLANS

The funds for the ‘low to medium value for money’ (according to the Department for Transport) Link Road and associated schemes will run to £150m or more, while the East Sussex bus support grant of £1.7m is apparently unaffordable. But ESCC is chasing many more millions of public funds to spend on grand road schemes along the coast without – as with the Link Road – considering sustainable, healthy alternatives that do not spawn sprawling and unhealthy car based developments. Health professionals warn us now of the impending crisis that will accompany obesity and consequent Type 2 diabetes caused by poor diets and sedentary lifestyles. A serious and urgent investment in alternative, healthy transport would help to avoid the worst of this: the last thing we need is more road building, its accompanying car dependency and its wasting of land. The costs imposed on the NHS through a failure to meet and beat the obesity challenge would, they warn, threaten the survival of the NHS.

INVEST IN CYCLING – DOUBLE DIGIT VALUE FOR MONEY

20’S PLENTY CAMPAIGN AND BELOW, POPULAR CYCLEWAY ON LEWES ROAD, BRIGHTON

A great example of popular cycle infrastructure investment is the Lewes Road cycleway, Brighton, opened late last year. Measures to support cycling such as this typically repay every pound of investment with up to £20 – in some cases the figure is even higher – of benefits in health improvement, better air quality, reduced CO2 and pollution, less noise and less parking space required.  Accompanied by 20mph zones to encourage cycling in all residential areas, such schemes promote strong growth in walking and cycling. Kings Drive, Eastbourne and St Helens Road, Hastings might be given the same treatment, while a route parallel to the railway line to Ore might also be successful.

It is clear that a strong commitment and major shift to investment in sustainable transport, rather than a car-based future with its accompanying health disbenefits and environmental degradation, both rural and urban, is a way forward to improve public health – physical and mental.

For up to date information on the threats posed by authorities promoting major and very costly road building along the south coast, see the website of newly formed South Coast Alliance on Transport and the Environment (SCATE):

South Coast Alliance on Transport and the Environment .

See also:

Combe Haven Defenders | Stop Osborne’s Roads to …

Combe Haven and its smaller tributary valleys are currently being transformed by construction works on a massive scale – and this is only the beginning.

Doubtless, many of those who have cherished the experience of walking in these valleys in their lifetimes feel powerless to do anything at all to prevent the progress of the road scheme that will deliver anything up to 30,000 vehicles a day through this exceptionally tranquil and beautiful environment.

A reminder of the scheme’s characteristics:

• It is the worst scheme of 45 currently under development in England for CO2 emissions. Minister for climate change and MP for Bexhill Greg Barker is not bothered. It was the second worst of the 45 for ‘value for money‘, and cost increases of £14m since chancellor Osborne’s approval suggest that it’s now bottom.
• There are no firm strategies for monitoring the environmental mitigation measures. As yet, we don’t know who will do the monitoring or even if it will be carried out. The status, extent and nature of monitoring remain ‘theoretical’.
• Alternatives were never looked at. The Department for Transport was found by the independent Information Commissioner to be wrong to conceal from the public that immediately prior to the chancellor’s ‘green light’ to approve BHLR funding, a ‘public transport’ based strategy was also on offer to ministers  Shocking enough on its own.

Despite winning funding for this ‘gold plated’ road scheme, about which there is a great deal of information, there is a lack of information about the range of alternative and sustainable transport options that will be available as (if) the BHLR opens for traffic. There was less than half a page on the subject in the original 200 page bid to government in 2004, and there has been little hard information ever since. Even worse, following a rather secretive and poorly conducted study, Rother District Council want to kill off for good plans for a new station at Glyne Gap.

We can only conclude that those without access to a car (including everyone under 17), as well as those who would like to use their cars less, are apparently considered by those designing our future transport networks as somehow of a lower status. That’s disgraceful. The needs of this significant and growing constituency of people must be met and their numbers increased in order to limit the dire effects of climate change. In this respect, the BHLR is the worst possible option, with the consequent car dependent developments eating up scarce land and set to spew thousands of tonnes of climate change gases.

Back to that ‘feeling of powerlessness’: Harriet, a Crowhurst resident and artist, is recording this transformation on canvas as part of the story of the road. It is a commitment to telling that story – of how the road came to this stage in its construction.  So far, it’s a story of the triumph of dull, dangerous orthodoxy and profit over sustainability: a story of irresponsibility towards the next generation and its quality of life, and a failure to ensure for that generation a better and fairer world. Telling that story might prevent other similar unsustainable road based developments from tainting the planet. The Hastings Alliance and others like Harriet will continue to tell the story:

‘In just how many ways is this a story of how things should not be done?’

Harriet records the unfolding tragedy

Concerned Crowhurst residents by Powdermill Stream

Habitat severance at Decoy Stream Valley – early Spring

Decoy Stream Valley this week (Oct 6th)

Buzzard circles over Watermill Stream. Vegetation replaced by extensive crushed rock

Alder – Combe Haven Valley. Oct 6th

ROADS FIRST’ IS THE DEPRESSING PICTURE IN THE REST OF ENGLAND

Elsewhere in England, new Local Transport Bodies are now in place to bid for funding predominantly for, it turns out, road schemes. Their wish lists include not a single cycling scheme and ‘sustainable transport’ hardly features at all. In the South East  (Essex, Kent, East Sussex, Southend and Thurrock) the Transport Board scores 2.2 out  of 10 for sustainable transport, with new roads at the top of its agenda for funding. Download the full report here (pdf)

John Shaw, long time BHLR fan, advises the Local Transport Board, chaired by former East Sussex County Council leader, Peter Jones. Of the 31 attendees – or would be attendees – 31 out of 33 are male. The parallel Local Enterprise Partnership for the South East is also chaired by Peter Jones and has 40 male and 4 female members. These are very interesting statistics which do nothing to instil confidence in decisions taken. Jobs for the boys? We have to say that the ‘development pool’ process (as highlighted in the report above) produced a far more mature and responsible approach than that being adopted by the new Local Transport Body setup. The environment and sustainability are way down the list.

FOOTNOTE

We have been privileged to contribute evidence in support of those of the Combe Haven Defenders tried in court in Hastings in September. Trials continue and there will be more news about their fate and other matters in the weeks ahead.

BHLR – COSTS RISE £13.35m.

The costs increase, funded entirely by the county’s council tax payers, was approved by ESCC 0n the 10th July, bringing the current total of public funding required to £113.35m. This increase alone could have funded  a step change in bus services for Bexhill and Hastings, a new station at Glyne Gap – and area wide walking and cycling facilities. The funds were voted through in a knockabout full council meeting almost devoid of evidence, with no councillors opposing the increase. An account of proceedings follows, accompanied by a summary of the preceding Planning Committee meeting where almost all concerns around the supposedly non-material amendments to the BHLR scheme – including removal of a bus lane –  were swept aside. (see ‘A Day at County Hall’ below.)

BHLR – A DAY AT COUNTY HALL

ESCC PLANNING COMMITTEE

On July 10^th,  2013, East Sussex County Council Planning Committee considered their authority’s ‘non-material amendments’ (NMAs) to the BHLR scheme. Three objectors to the NMAs had registered a wish to address the Planning Committee and did so on the proposed amendments concerning Drainage and Flooding contingencies, the bus lane removal, and ‘Greenway’ alterations. Pete Caunter spoke on the first of these, Derrick Coffee on the second, and Andrea Needham on the third. All three speakers held that the amendments were material amendments departing significantly from the original BHLR plans, and that therefore the planning process would need to be re-run.

Before this, Planning Officer Tony Cook argued that the amendments were relatively minor, and the effects were predicted to be either neutral or environmentally beneficial.

With ‘extreme weather events’ on the increase, increased surface runoff from roads and the newly built up environment, and rising sea level all adding to uncertainties around the capacity of drainage infrastructure to cope, Pete Caunter’s concerns were legitimate and were echoing neighbours’ worries about these matters: Pete and the neighbours live along the line of the Egerton Stream which at intervals in the past, has caused flooding problems both near their homes and also in Egerton Park which floods regularly. Pete flagged up the issue of frequent flooding in the Combe Haven valley and the danger and impracticability of substituting fords for bridges.

Derrick Coffee’s concerns were around the contradiction between ESCC’s expression of certainties supporting the case for the bus lane removal and uncertainties or complete ignorance around future levels of bus services: the nature and extent of those services is after all, unknown, including to ESCC. Consultants working for ESCC have suggested that services could be expanded and the two regional hospitals of Eastbourne and Hastings have both talked openly of the need for bus services linking the two to provide access to the different clinical services that each will in future offer. Those consultants have made no reference though to evening, Sunday and Bank Holiday services. Derrick Spoke on behalf of the Hastings Alliance.

Speaking for the Combe Haven Defenders, Andrea Needham pointed out that the exercise in amendments was a purely ‘cost cutting’ (‘value engineering’) one, dressed up as inconsequential, minor and very sensible changes to the scheme. She gave an example of an application to a planning committee for the provision of a canopy to a small area of a school playground being viewed as ‘material’, while major amendments in today’s BHLR plan were somehow ‘non-material’. Diversions of the ‘Greenway’ would make it less attractive to non-vehicle users, resulting in more car trips, provision of a ford instead of a bridge would create hazards in flood conditions, and arrangements for combining equestrians, pedestrians an cyclists would cause conflict.

Following our addresses, various councillors’ commented, mostly in support of the ESCC position. Only Cllr Field agreed that the bus lane removal was a ‘material amendment’ and that there was a danger of traffic backing up behind buses.

Cllr Ensor’s views (Bexhill) would, he said, exclude all representations of those not living in his locality.

Tony Cook summed up and demonstrated a misunderstanding of Derrick’s point around the anticipated ‘low’ level of bus services. Derrick described this expectation of bus services as ‘pessimistic and unimaginative’; Tony Cook referred to that pessimism as a description of the function of the amendment to the junction without the bus lane. He thus missed the point altogether that the ‘low level’ of bus services cannot be assumed because no-one on the planning committee has any idea of the future extent or nature of bus services. There is no bus strategy.

FULL COUNCIL MEETING – SAME DAY

Summary:

The funding increase of over £13m was agreed after almost 2 hours of overwhelmingly evidence free dialogue: you couldn’t call it debate.

Accusations of incompetent management of finances came from the Lib Dems and Labour, accompanied by calls for Lead Member for Transport Economy and Environment to resign. These were very soon laid aside with assertions of support in the light of the ‘higher costs of cancellation’. There was fear expressed of then losing the government’s £56m (now less than half the costs). This of course ignored the ‘non-BHLR, public transport option’ that we now know was offered to ministers so, no, the funds would not necessarily be lost. That’s of no interest: they will have their road whatever the cost.

Just one councilor (Rosalyn St Pierre, Lib Dem, Ringmer and Lewes Bridge) queried the BHLR ‘jobs assertions’ mentioning the DfT assessment of ‘1,000’, flowing from the road and developments. That was the sole piece of evidence featured in the whole session. She also queried the levelling of blame at protestors. She suggested that it had been foolish to pretend that protests would not arise: they were predictable. “Many young people hate road building” she said.

Cllr Field (Lib Dem Battle/Crowhurst) didn’t want this road but supported a road. She also supported some development in villages to ensure viable services were available.

Cllr Hodges, (Labour, Hastings) believed that the (3,500!) jobs would flow to the premises (and their vast car parks?) and create clusters.

Cllr Shuttleworth (Lib Dem, Eastbourne) warned that there may be further requests for even more money from ESCC coffers.

Cllr Pragnell (Con, Hastings) Defended the increase ‘…benefits the whole county…3,000 jobs’, while Cllr Elkin, (Con Eastbourne) spoke in similar vein – panacea for jobs, etc.

Cllr Carstairs (UKIP) simply offered support. Clr Keeley (UKIP) – known to be opposed to BHLR, was not present.

Cllr Wallis (Lib Dem, Eastbourne) echoing Cllr St Pierre’s scepticism, alone expressed doubt over the links between roads and jobs.

The low points of the meeting (there were many) were characterised by comments on:

Jobs – there would be 3,000; there would be 3,500. It varied during the meeting. These would all be ‘high quality’ jobs.

Environment –  cancelling the BHLR would lead to desecration of the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) – it would be opened up for developers. The Combe Haven is less important than the AONB. BHLR would allow people to enjoy the scenery as they drive through. People could get to the countryside more easily.

Costs –  Cllr Tutt – Lib Dem, Eastbourne, quoted the costs of BHLR to local council tax payers as £288.00 for every inhabitant of East Sussex. He then went on to support the increase.

Costs for the BHLR were described as rising from £50m to £113m now. (This ignored the 2002 cost assessment of £24m (South Coast Multi-Modal Study), and misquoted the government’s conditional approval in 2004 of £47m).

Lead member for Economy, Transport and Environment, Cllr Carl Maynard, spoke of the benefits to the ‘travel to work area’ (with BHLR, to become the ‘drive to work area’?). Cllr Simmons described the investment in the road as ‘an exact science’. An amazing claim which shows  clearly that he has never read the Department for Transport’s analysis of the case for the Link Road. But hang on: we haven’t yet met a councillor who has read it. Obsessive progress of this great and expensive ‘vanity project’ doesn’t permit an analytical approach.

One councillor was barracked for suggesting that the rising costs from the capital budget were unpalatable in the light of cuts to services. He wasn’t evidently understanding the separation of budgets. But the public’s anger of this profligate use of their money in a time of cuts is real, and we should remember the threat made by former leader Cllr Peter Jones to use capital from the education budget to fund the road if he didn’t get a government contribution.

Blame for delay was laid by some councillors at the door not only of the protestors but that of the Department for Transport. Clearly the conduct of the BHLR project by the County Council is viewed by councillors as ‘perfect’. The awful truth is that most delays are due to mismanagement by the council itself, and that is in no small part due to their pursuit at any cost of what is at best a mediocre road scheme irrelevant to the needs of Bexhill and Hastings, and at worst a disaster for the county as a whole and Bexhill and Hastings in particular. Failure of ESCC to work effectively with the government’s statutory environmental bodies – Environment Agency, Natural England and English Heritage – cost them a delay of almost three years between the 2004 ministerial approval  and the 2007 planning application to which all three raised objections, two formally. The 2004 approval, incidentally, costed the BHLR at £47m!

GATHERING IN THE VALLEY – 13th JULY AT CROWHURST

Hundreds turned up for the national rally at Crowhurst recreation ground on a glorious day to hear music, speeches from local and national figures, enjoy a coconut shie and great food. Walkers arrived with guides from Bexhill, St Leonards, Hastings and Crowhurst stations to see the valley, scarred but still tranquil.

Speakers included Stephen Joseph, Director of the Campaign for Better Transport; John Stewart, veteran campaigner from Clear Skies/Plane Stupid (Heathrow, third runway issue); Ralph Smyth, Senior Transport Campaigner at CPRE; Georgia Wrighton of CPRE Sussex; Tony Whitbread, CEO of Sussex Wildlife Trust, also speaking for Wildlife Trusts UK.

Andrea Needham of Combe Haven Defenders, Derrick Coffee of Campaign for Better Transport- East Sussex, Michael Bernard of BLINKRR and Sonia Howley of Crowhurst Road to Nowhere Action Group gave a local take on the history of the scheme, heritage of the valley(s) and the habitat destruction evident to all who passed through the valley on this day.

The successful event was organised by Crowhurst Road to Nowhere Action Group; Combe Haven Defenders and Campaign for Better Transport.

The  Combe Haven Defenders website carries excellent coverage of the day’s events and other news:

Combe Haven Defenders | Stop Osborne’s Roads to Nowhere: Stop …

Two excellent letters from the Hastings Observer express the continuing anger over the destructive and ever more costly road scheme:

H Obs Letters Jul 13_NEW

Decoy Stream Valley – Protest Camp Site – a once peaceful and beautiful little valley.

Attentive Audience

Georgia Wrighton, CPRE Sussex

Tony Whitbread, Sussex and UK Wildlife Trusts

Veteran campaigner, John Stewart

A shock to those who have known the valley

THE RALLY

A national rally will be held at Crowhurst recreation ground on Saturday, July 13th to protest against the government’s aggressive and destructive roads programme. Come along to hear speakers and learn more about the Bexhill to Hastings Link Road (BHLR). It is not too late to halt the destruction, and it’s never too late to demand an end to forced car dependency and its inevitable accompaniments: second rate public transport, dangerous walking and cycling environments, congestion (it’ll be shifted around), worsening public health and wasteful urban sprawl.  There’ll be guided walks, refreshments, music and poetry – an enjoyable and educational day out.

Details here: View it in your browser.

AMBER RUDD, MP, MEETING

Dr Judy Clark and Derrick Coffee met Amber Rudd MP at her surgery in Hastings Town Hall on Saturday, June 15th in response to her general invitation to hear views on matters including the BHLR, post disclosure of concealed information.

Observers may wonder of there was any point in going along, but our view was that the meeting had been offered to interested parties; the MP had publicly anticipated questions on the Link Road, and so it seemed sensible. We were well aware that the effort was highly unlikely to achieve any u-turn, or even a pause in the current destruction along and around the line of the route. In the end though, the dialogue was quite revealing, and the MP undertook to respond in writing to our concerns expressed through written questions read out and passed to her on the day.

We had a good half hour to present our concerns and describe the history of our involvement, though there was no debate to speak of around the core issues. The MP listened, but was resolute in her support for the scheme and although we represented the doubts expressed in DfTs’s own analysis, she remained fully supportive of the claims around jobs that the promoters expect to flow from it, and confident that the GENECON report’s forecasts were sound. This report calculated that the number of jobs produced through developments along the Link Road would equal the number of people that could be fitted in to the offices/factories built. This was aptly described by a leading UK academic as ‘nonsense on stilts’. For her, the DfT, and other experts,  are wrong, and nothing else would work because it isn’t the BHLR.

Nor was the MP troubled by the concealment from the public for nearly a year of a (much cheaper) ‘non-BHLR public transport based’ option, or that analysis of this option had been prematurely stopped in its tracks with the consequence that any measures that might have flowed from it never saw the light of day.

We gave our thanks for the 40 minute ‘exchange of views’, and Amber took our questions away with a promise to respond. The question, signed, and as left with the MP, is here:

and her response, just received, is here:

Disappointingly, Amber is taking a stance sincerely, but founded in a very shaky evidence base, while chancellor Osborne has no interest in evidence at all. On this particular issue, the Department for Transport appears to have been parked, and its very real and substantiated doubts swept aside at great cost to the public purse. The ‘environmental credentials’ of government look very shaky indeed.

LAPWINGS

A ‘red list’ species at particular risk of disappearing from large tracts of farmland where once they were a familiar and uplifting sight and sound, the lapwings breeding in Combe Haven were a symbol of success in adversity. Absent for a number of years, they bred several chicks this spring. Tragically, disturbed by the ESCC contractors, they appear to have abandoned their young to an unknown fate. Local ornithologist Cliff Dean has told the story on his website, link here: Combe Haven | Birding Walks in RXland

Greg Barker, MP, Minister for Climate Change (NB:BHLR=the dirtiest English road scheme for CO2 emissions), sat on a committee which published a report: ‘Halting Biodiversity Loss’, 2007/8. Well, almost, because according to the minutes of that committee, it appears he didn’t attend any of its meetings.

If he wasn’t comfy with that report’s ethos, maybe he should have a read of the ‘State of Nature’ report, reminding us of the central role of nature in the small matter of a decent quality of life for all and the not so small matter of survival itself. Report here: “State of Nature”

Certainly, people who can now enjoy the landscapes, wildlife and history of Combe Haven in a tranquil and remote setting within a short walk of home will have no equivalent after BHLR punches through the valley, accompanied by 25 – 30,000 vehicles a day. They’ll need to buy a car or find a bus (if there is one).

In the Hastings Observer of 31st May, Amber Rudd, MP for Hastings and Rye, repeats the call for the Baldslow Link in order to solve congestion problems on The Ridge. It would do no such thing.

Read our counter letter:

amber-counter-letter-v31.doc

The article here, from last week’s Hastings Observer is hugely symbolic. It………….

……….demonstrates that Amber Rudd, MP for Hastings and Chancellor Osborne’s Private Parliamentary Secretary, is still happy to repeat the very shaky assertions of ESCC on jobs they claim will flow from BHLR scheme: 3,000 plus, as against the Department for Transport’s analysis of 900 – 1,000. She is misleading her constituents.

The disclosure by the DfT of their officials’ recommendation immediately prior to the funding announcement in the 2012 is to say the least, revealing. As reported in the local and national press, the recommendations included an option of not funding the BHLR, but instead offering:

‘support  (for) development of a package of alternative transport measures of benefit to the area’.

 Read the disclosures here:

DEPARTMENT FOR TRANSPORT DOCUMENTS DISCLOSED AT LAST!

There has certainly been an ‘economy of truth’ here, and because of Chancellor Osborne’s pressure to get the funding announcement into the budget, research into the alternative option was halted prematurely. We want, and the public need to know, what that (inevitably much cheaper) alternative might have delivered. The research should be completed.

In the same article, Amber Rudd claims that the building of the Baldslow Link to the A21 would relieve traffic on The Ridge. ESCC’s evidence to the public inquiry suggested otherwise. By far the largest proportion of traffic is internal to Bexhill and Hastings as illustrated by the ESCC figure here:

This scheme is controversial because of the uncertainty and evident exaggeration around anticipated benefits, the certainty of its destruction of habitats and landscape, huge cost to the public purse and most worringly, the ignorance of evidence on the part of its promoters. Let’s not forget that after its comprehensive assessment process, the Department for Transport rated it second from bottom for value for money, and worst by far for CO2 emissions out of 45 current schemes in England.

Meanwhile, the Rother District Council planning application for the link road from the BHLR to serve developments has attracted over 450 objections. Rother’s consultants helping them progress the application include ‘Genecon’ who came up with the fantasy unchallenged assertion of 3,000 jobs for ESCC.

Amber Rudd, Greg Barker (minister for Climate Change – you couldn’t make it up!) are dismissing evidence, talking rubbish, and in the process of delivering rubbish.

Against this background, and as the photos here show, the destruction and degradation of the Combe Haven and Watermill Stream valleys progresses.

One photo, taken on June 2nd, shows  a pair of supposedly protected lapwings attending to and seeking to protect their nest their within the construction site perimeter.

PHOTOS, June 1st, 2013:

1. Barn at Adams Farm – bat roost to be demolished and relocated. Prospects for bats: uncertain. The ‘haul road’ is in the distance.

2. Remains of the hedgerow, Buckholt Lane,  now completely grubbed

3. Stump of a once mature oak at the foot of Watermill Stream valley

Below:

4. Lapwing circling. One of a pair of these protected birds, currently nesting within the construction site, and not seen breeding in the valley for some time.

5.The haul road has now extended to the foot of Watermill Stream valley. If it goes further east, it will interrupt the lapwings. ESCC ecological surveys have dismissed the needs of these birds. 

6. Damaged sign. These high quality signs are felt by many to be hugely ironic.

Damaged information board