18 Jan: Unevicted! Third Road Protest Camp Still in Place

PLEASE NOTE: We’re cur­rent­ly expe­ri­enc­ing prob­lems with our (out­go­ing) text mes­sag­ing.

PLEASE NOTE: We’re cur­rent­ly expe­ri­enc­ing prob­lems with our (out­go­ing) text mes­sag­ing. Until fur­ther notice, please direct all texts and calls to 07926 423 033, and check your email (assum­ing you’ve signed-up to our email list), this web-site and the Face­book page to keep up to speed on what’s hap­pen­ing.

VIDEO: https://www.indymedia.org.uk/media/2013/01//505637.3gp

The third of three protest camps (“Decoy Pond”) against the Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) remains unevict­ed today (Fri­day 18 Jan). Sup­port­ers and vis­i­tors are wel­come! See maps above and below for loca­tion and direc­tions.

Two cam­paign­ers occu­py­ing trees at the now-evict­ed “Base Camp” were arrest­ed yes­ter­day (Thurs­day 18 Jan­u­ary), bring­ing the total num­ber of arrests since the peace­ful protests began on 14 Decem­ber to nine­teen.

Please note: “Decoy Pond” camp is a bit trick­i­er to get to than the (now evict­ed) main camp was. In par­tic­u­lar, at present you need to be fair­ly steady on your feet to nav­i­gate the rough and icy ter­rain.

Press release Combe Haven Defend­ers [1]
Fri­day 18 Jan­u­ary
Con­tact 07926 423 033

UNEVICTED! THIRD ROAD PROTEST CAMP STILL IN PLACE, AS LOCAL GRANDMOTHERS MOBILISE TO SUPPORT PROTESTS
Cam­paign­ers still in trees as total num­ber of arrests reach­es nine­teen

Fri­day 18 Jan­u­ary, Crowhurst: The third of three protest camps (“Decoy Pond”) against the Bex­hill-Hast­ings Link Road (BHLR) remains unevict­ed today (18 Jan), as local grand­moth­ers mobilise to show their oppo­si­tion to the Road and sup­port for the peace­ful protests.

Fol­low­ing their suc­cess­ful “Grannie Tree” action – pho­tos from which appeared in the Dai­ly Tele­graph among oth­er places [2] – local grand­moth­ers are organ­is­ing a sec­ond “Grannies Pho­to­shoot” against the Road this Sat­ur­day (19 Jan), meet­ing at 12.45pm by the Recre­ation Ground near The Plough pub in Crowhurst (TN33 9AW) [2].

Two cam­paign­ers occu­py­ing trees at the now-evict­ed “Base Camp” were arrest­ed yes­ter­day, bring­ing the total num­ber of arrests since the peace­ful protests began on 14 Decem­ber to nine­teen.

Like the two camps that have already been evict­ed this week, “Decoy Pond” is locat­ed on the pro­posed route of the BHLR (see foot­note [3] for maps and loca­tion).

The peace­ful protests against the road– which have now been run­ning for over a month – have seized nation­al atten­tion over the past week [4]. Tree-felling work for the road start­ed on 14 Decem­ber 2012 and rep­re­sents the first sig­nif­i­cant work on the high­ly-con­tro­ver­sial 3 mile £100m road, one of over forty “zom­bie roads” that were declared dead years ago but have now been resus­ci­tat­ed as part of as part of Britain’s largest road-build­ing pro­gramme in 25 years [5, 6].

Gabriel Car­lyle, a spokesper­son for the Combe Haven Defend­ers: “Despite the freez­ing tem­per­a­tures – and the mas­sive resources deployed against them by East Sus­sex Coun­ty Coun­cil – cam­paign­ers are still occu­py­ing the trees along the route of the BHLR. The last month of protests are only the begin­ning of a sus­tained cam­paign of peace­ful resis­tance to this envi­ron­men­tal­ly dis­as­trous £100m white-ele­phant project.”

Con­tact 07926 423 033

NOTES
[1] www.combehavendefenders.org.uk
[2] https://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/2013/01/17/sat-19-jan-grannies-photoshoot‑2/
[3] Near­by post­code TN33 9AY. See maps above.
[4] http://combehavendefenders.wordpress.com/recent-media-coverage/
[5] See ‘Con­tro­ver­sial ‘zom­bie roads’ scheme to be resus­ci­tat­ed’, Guardian, 10 Octo­ber 2012, http://tinyurl.com/zombieroads
[6] http://bettertransport.org.uk/media/26-Oct-roads-report