Veteran road protestors threaten new campaign of direct action against government's recently unveiled 10 year transport plan.
Audio interview with one of the delegates
- mp3 1.0M
Outside the Department for Transport
Once inside the building
Twyford Down - the spark that ignited all the 1990s road protests
Recent view of the road cutting through the once beautiful Twyford Down
A delegation of veteran road-protestors visited the Department for Transport on Wednesday 21'st July at 2pm and delivered a letter stating that Labour's road building plans - and even the planning process that leads to new roads - will be met by protests similar to those of the 1990s. This is in response to the failure to scrap new road plans in today's 10 year transport plan. We demanded that no new roads should be built, or the government will face more direct action protests. The delegation was comprised of a representative from each of the major road protests of the 1990s, when direct action dogged road building across the nation, increasing the costs of road building by £ millions.
Rebecca Lush who, exactly 11 years ago in July 1993, was imprisoned for her part in the protests at the M3 through Twyford Down in Hampshire, and co-founded the national orgainisation Road Alert! said:
"The 10 year Transport Plan represented an opportunity to scrap the roads programme that Labour have been steadily building up by stealth. These new roads are a U-turn on promises Labour made when in opposition, when they accepted evidence that more roads create more traffic. Current road building plans will simply increase traffic, are in direct conflict with Labour's supposed commitments to protect the environment and combat climate change, and are starting to rival the Tories old road building programme"
The letter to Alistair Darling (reproduced below) warns of future protests that would disrupt both the planning and building of new roads, and the delegation also presented Mr Darling with a bicycle D-lock, as a symbol of the road protests of the 1990s. Locks such as these were used by protestors to attach themselves to bulldozers in order to prevent road construction from taking place.
Reading from the letter, Rebecca Lush continued:
"During the 1990's large scale protests laid siege to road developments, leading to a major shift in transport policy. We are not prepared to let those gains be sacrificed; if you plan new road building, you should expect protests of the same commitment. The difference is that these protests will occur throughout the entire planning processes; we will not wait for the bulldozers to arrive this time. Protests will follow these roads every step of the way."
Delegates were from the following campaigns:
Twyford Down, M3 Hampshire
M11 Link Road, London
Newbury bypass
Stanworth Valley, M65 Lancs
Fairmile, A30 Devon
Solsbury Hill, A46 Bath
Oxleas Wood, London
Birmingham Northern Relief Road
Wymondham, A11 Norfolk
Salisbury, A36
Jesmond Dene, Newcastle
Blackwood, South Wales
Road Alert!
Rising Tide
Reclaim the Streets
Earth First
They included 3 people imprisoned for the M3 protests through Twyford Down, that kickstarted the direct action roads protests, and also Eleanor "Animal" who spent days down the famous tunnels at Fairmile in Devon.
The letter delivered to Alistair Darling, transport minister:
Dear Mr Darling
We are here today to express our disappointment that new road building was not ruled out in your 10 year Transport Plan, and to demand that you scrap the road building plans you have already announced or approved, including the M6 toll road, all motorway widening, the A303 Blackdown Hills Road, and the A354 Weymouth Road. These roads are a U-turn on Labour's unequivocal promises whilst in opposition, when you accepted the logic that new roads meant more traffic. Your current plans will simply increase traffic and are in direct conflict with all of Labour's committments to reduce carbon emissions, and combat climate change.
During the 1990's large-scale protests laid seige to road developments, leading to a major shift in transport policy. We are not prepared to let those gains be sacrificed; if you plan new road building you should expect protests of the same level of committment. The difference is that these protests, will occur throughout the entire planning processes; we will not wait for the bulldozers to arrive this time. Protests will follow these roads every step of the way.
Accompanying this letter is a bicycle D-Lock. This is a reminder of the road protests of the 1990's when we used such locks to disrupt road building by attaching ourselves to bulldovers and other construction machinery.
This letter is delivered by a representitative from each of the following road protests and campaign groups:
Twyford Down, M3 Hampshire
M11 Link Road, London
Newbury bypass
Stanworth Valley, M65 Lancs
Fairmile, A30 Devon
Solsbury Hill, A46 Bath
Oxleas Wood, London
Birmingham Northern Relief Road
Wymondham, A11 Norfolk
Salisbury, A36
Jesmond Dene, Newcastle
Blackwood, South Wales
Road Alert!
Rising Tide
Reclaim the Streets
Rebecca Lush who, exactly 11 years ago in July 1993, was imprisoned for her part in the protests at the M3 through Twyford Down in Hampshire, and co-founded the national orgainisation Road Alert! said:
"The 10 year Transport Plan represented an opportunity to scrap the roads programme that Labour have been steadily building up by stealth. These new roads are a U-turn on promises Labour made when in opposition, when they accepted evidence that more roads create more traffic. Current road building plans will simply increase traffic, are in direct conflict with Labour's supposed commitments to protect the environment and combat climate change, and are starting to rival the Tories old road building programme"
The letter to Alistair Darling (reproduced below) warns of future protests that would disrupt both the planning and building of new roads, and the delegation also presented Mr Darling with a bicycle D-lock, as a symbol of the road protests of the 1990s. Locks such as these were used by protestors to attach themselves to bulldozers in order to prevent road construction from taking place.
Reading from the letter, Rebecca Lush continued:
"During the 1990's large scale protests laid siege to road developments, leading to a major shift in transport policy. We are not prepared to let those gains be sacrificed; if you plan new road building, you should expect protests of the same commitment. The difference is that these protests will occur throughout the entire planning processes; we will not wait for the bulldozers to arrive this time. Protests will follow these roads every step of the way."
Delegates were from the following campaigns:
Twyford Down, M3 Hampshire
M11 Link Road, London
Newbury bypass
Stanworth Valley, M65 Lancs
Fairmile, A30 Devon
Solsbury Hill, A46 Bath
Oxleas Wood, London
Birmingham Northern Relief Road
Wymondham, A11 Norfolk
Salisbury, A36
Jesmond Dene, Newcastle
Blackwood, South Wales
Road Alert!
Rising Tide
Reclaim the Streets
Earth First
They included 3 people imprisoned for the M3 protests through Twyford Down, that kickstarted the direct action roads protests, and also Eleanor "Animal" who spent days down the famous tunnels at Fairmile in Devon.
The letter delivered to Alistair Darling, transport minister:
Dear Mr Darling
We are here today to express our disappointment that new road building was not ruled out in your 10 year Transport Plan, and to demand that you scrap the road building plans you have already announced or approved, including the M6 toll road, all motorway widening, the A303 Blackdown Hills Road, and the A354 Weymouth Road. These roads are a U-turn on Labour's unequivocal promises whilst in opposition, when you accepted the logic that new roads meant more traffic. Your current plans will simply increase traffic and are in direct conflict with all of Labour's committments to reduce carbon emissions, and combat climate change.
During the 1990's large-scale protests laid seige to road developments, leading to a major shift in transport policy. We are not prepared to let those gains be sacrificed; if you plan new road building you should expect protests of the same level of committment. The difference is that these protests, will occur throughout the entire planning processes; we will not wait for the bulldozers to arrive this time. Protests will follow these roads every step of the way.
Accompanying this letter is a bicycle D-Lock. This is a reminder of the road protests of the 1990's when we used such locks to disrupt road building by attaching ourselves to bulldovers and other construction machinery.
This letter is delivered by a representitative from each of the following road protests and campaign groups:
Twyford Down, M3 Hampshire
M11 Link Road, London
Newbury bypass
Stanworth Valley, M65 Lancs
Fairmile, A30 Devon
Solsbury Hill, A46 Bath
Oxleas Wood, London
Birmingham Northern Relief Road
Wymondham, A11 Norfolk
Salisbury, A36
Jesmond Dene, Newcastle
Blackwood, South Wales
Road Alert!
Rising Tide
Reclaim the Streets
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Comments
Hide the following 6 comments
Nice one...
23.07.2004 08:36
not a veteran
sorry - and i agree
23.07.2004 09:32
becca
Road building
23.07.2004 14:37
Everyone one of the roads got built.
Sophie
Well said
23.07.2004 16:34
The activist movement in the UK with respect to road building is one of complete failure. The original posting is a classic example, some friends go and stand around with nice little signs and ...... well that's it really.
Micky
Get real Sophie and Micky
24.07.2004 01:10
So how about all the other protests going on today?
War in Iraq and Afghanistan, were they stopped as a result of protests? No!
G8 summits etc, have they been stopped as a result of protests? No!
The world bank and IMF, have they been disbanded as a result of protests? No!
Climate change and deforestation, have they been reversed as a result of protests? No
Nuclear power and arms industry, have they been closed down? No!
Global capitalism, has it been overthrown as a result of protests? No!
GM, Has it been abandoned as a result of protests? YES! (well in this country at least)
Do both of you make similar negative and snidey comments about every protest reported on this site that doesn't achieve instant success? If not, then why not? Be consistent please. Are you so shallow and immature that you always expect instant gratification?
I find your remarks thoroughly disrespectful to all the thousands of dedicated activists who became criminalised, injuncted, imprisoned, beaten up, injured and marginalised because they heroically chose to defend YOUR environment against a reckless onslaught by the corrupt government, greedy big business and the bleating road lobby.
The tory government's £23 billion "roads for prosperity" programme announced in the early 1990s was hailed as the greatest road building spree since the Romans. We could have all sat on our arses (would you have?) and done absolutely sod all as vast areas of British countryside were irreversibly destroyed by the bulldozers. Fortunately some of us did decide to go dozer diving, firstly at Twyford Down in a desperate attempt to stop this insanity. Doubtless many fervently believed we could stop each individual road scheme. Some of us, myself included, quickly realised that it was a very long shot. After all, this was the same government that had vindictively destroyed the entire British mining industry as punishment for when the miners had previously brought down the earlier Heath Tory government back in the 1970s. They would hardly want to be seen to give in directly to a rag tag bunch of hippies. Yet we all continued unabashed and the protests kept on escalating.
So it was, that after only a few years, this truly mad roads programme was massively slashed, (supposedly to save costs, yeah!) sparing dozens of other threatened areas of countryside from the bulldozers. I'd call that a pretty big success, what do you still think? The simple fact was, that the embarrassment we were causing government ministers, by continuous, unrelenting direct action protests in their face, on their roofs even and regularly across their newspapers and TV screens just became too much for them to endure. Not only that, our protests also served to highlight that we cannot keep destroying the environment in the name of "progress". Mainstream society too, sat up and really started to take on board the previously under reported fact that you cannot build your way out of traffic congestion, they have to stop relying on their cars so much as it's just not sustainable. Not only that, but so many of all the different protests going on today, listed at the beginning of this comment, have borrowed techniques from, and were in no small part, spawned from the original Twyford Down protests. These had initially comprised of just a small handful of very courageous, brilliant and completely dedicated people who didn't just give up after being viciously assaulted by an army of Group 4 thugs on Yellow Wednesday back in 1993. Don't go declaring that all activists today are somehow superior or more successful than the road protestors of then. Many so-called "activists" of today seem incapable of showing sustained interest in any important cause unless it involves regular partying. We were usually way too busy charging around in seas of mud or barricading houses to spend much time on frivolous activities back then.
The delegation on Wednesday was put together at ridiculously short notice and yes, we could have listed all the areas of countryside that were SAVED as a result of our protests. The simple fact is, is that such names are far less memorable or poignant to everyone than the places that were destroyed forever. Being honest, I can't easily recall the names of any axed road schemes but could quickly rattle off the names of just about every bit of countryside or community permanently destroyed during those insane times. Nostalgia can be quite a powerful emotion.
So in future you may consider directing further snivelling and trolling remarks to sites where they'd be more appreciated such as the rabid association of British drivers.
www.abd.org.uk
I'd suggest you also remember that wars aren't always won overnight as a result of winning individual battles. Always look at the bigger picture.
kriptick
one succesful protest
25.05.2005 15:35
binsted veteran