Road-building protesters score first victory in the second battle of Hastings

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2013/jan/18/road-building-protesters-victory-hastings

Version 0 of 1.

King Harold's loss to Duke William of Normandy back in 1066 did a good job of putting Hastings on the map. Now the quiet countryside of the south coast is once again the scene of a great battle, and perhaps the start of a conflict that could last years.

In the trees of Combe Haven, on the proposed site of a new link road between Hastings and Bexhill, protesters have been bravely battling East Sussex council. Campaigners argue that the proposed road will be expensive, unnecessary and ineffective at tackling congestion. The road will cut through a beautiful and treasured water meadow between St Leonards and Bexhill.

The people in the trees, who have ranged from local parents to school governors as well as some hardened environmental activists with names like Sitting Bull, are at the forefront of fighting a national road-building project that the government hopes will take off in a big way over the next few years.

The Campaign for Better Transport has identified 191 road projects in the England and Wales that are proposed in the near future by the Highways Agency and local government. The government is seeking money from private investors and local transport bodies have been created, fronted by business groups, to drive forward road building across the country.

Of course something very similar to this has happened before. In the late 1980s the Conservative government of the time launched, with much fanfare, Roads for Prosperity. This document set out plans to massively expand the road network, claiming it was for the good of the economy and to ease congestion. The new roads were met with huge opposition and there were mass protests against individual schemes – the result was that 75% of the planned roads were never built. The Tory transport minister in 1992 was Steven Norris. Here's what he has to say on the road building plans of the early 90s:

<blockquote> "I … saw first hand the difficulty in implementing the Roads for Prosperity programme. Such was the opposition and cost, three-quarters of the plans never got off the drawing board … Experience tells us that a massive programme of road building won't solve these problems [of economic inertia, congested roads and housing shortages]."</blockquote>

There is a myth at the heart of every road building project: that new, wider roads reduce congestion. In fact the evidence suggests that road building offers very low value for money as a way of reducing the amount of time people spend stuck in traffic jams compared with policies that reduce the demand for road transport. New roads tend to increase congestion on local roads (by up to 137% according to the Highways Agency) as well as creating new car journeys. If new roads aren't even good at easing congestion then what are they good for?

These projects certainly aren't good for our health. Experts believe that 70% of air pollution comes from cars and lorries. We know that 29,000 people die every year in the UK because of air pollution, yet we plan to build more space for vehicles and increase the amount of toxins in the air. Major new roads, like the Hastings to Bexhill link, just don't make sense.

Protesters against these road building plans are the vanguard of environmental activism. The Combe Haven Defenders continue to argue their points in the face of a stubborn dismissal of their concerns by East Sussex council. They set a good example for other caring people to follow. As history shows us: we can win.

• Keith Taylor is Green party MEP for the south east