Those That Walk Amongst Us

We predicted, some time ago, that the announcement that the Government wished to push ahead with improving the A303/A30/A358 corridor to the West Country would flush out every failed and ill-considered proposal that has ever seen the light of day over the last half century or so.  Sadly, but all too predictably, we have not been disappointed.

We've said, all along, that our goal is to dual the A303, bypass the beleaguered village of Winterbourne Stoke and improve the traffic situation on local roads, particularly those in and around Shrewton to our north.  However, in achieving our goal, our second aim is to ensure the best possible environment for the whole of the World Heritage Site; much of which lies within our Parish boundaries - almost certainly making us the most visited village in England, on a per capita basis, as English Heritage's Stonehenge Visitor's Centre lies within our boundaries. Also lying within our perimeter lies what is arguably the most important feature of the World Heritage Site - not Stonehenge, which is something of a "Jonny Come Lately", but the Longbarrow which pre-dates even the earliest phase of Stonehenge by half a millennium.

Actually, only the left hand side of the Longbarrow lies within the parish of Winterbourne Stoke, the right hand (south eastern) side lies in the parish of Wilsford Cum Lake.

You'd have thought that there would be a common view, locally, to enhance this landscape.  Not a bit of it, it seems.  Though to be fair, no-one has yet, in recent times, sought the views of the locals in any consistent way.   That said, there seem to be several favoured alternatives locally:

A - Any solution that gets rid of the traffic jams;
B - A tunnel of 2.9km;
C - An even longer tunnel;
D - Dualling along the existing route, but sinking it in a ditch;
E - Putting the road way to the north, across the southern edge of the Salisbury Plain training area - to the north of Larkhill;
F - Putting the road south of Amesbury on any one of half a dozen routes.

The first solution (A) is borne of desperation by those who live along the A303 - understandable, but it may not help preserve our heritage.  (B) and (C) achieve the aims of dualling the A303 and taking the road out of the World Heritage Site.  The longer the tunnel the better, in environmental and heritage terms, but it comes at a cost.  Perhaps the biggest advantage is that it would enable ALL vehicles, including most of the coaches used by English Heritage and the risible Land Train, to be excluded from the environment.  Of course, you would need to provide some mechanised transport for the disabled and elderly, but every other bugger could walk into the landscape from the Visitor's Centre, Larkhill, Amesbury, etc.  The route of the A303 could be returned to a green Bridleway throughout the WHS

(E) is an interesting option.  The Armed Forces would kick and scream, but even with the current re-basing exercise, it's hard to justify still needing as much space to exercise our much diminished Forces as we did at the height of WWI and WWII.  It would be an inexpensive route, with few landowners to deal with and would remove the A303 from the WHS.  Far too sensible an option to be considered.

(F) looks superficially promising, until you get stuck into the detail. There are way too many vested interests that would help kill it off.  It may have been a viable option 50 years ago when the idea of improving things was first mooted, but the world has moved on - unlike many of the proponents of this schemes.

Finally, we have option (D).  About the only positive thing that can be said about this option is that it is cheap and cheerful.  It does nothing to enhance the environment of the World Heritage site - and here it is important to stress one thing - whether or not the landscape around Stonehenge remains as a World Heritage site is immaterial to the argument of how the area is crossed.  It comes down to whether WE as a region, WE as a nation, want to leave something valuable to posterity - or simply want to bung in a cheap and nasty road and to hell with the consequences.   Those that are pushing for this option are doing so on the basis of simple cost (certainly not cost in the broader sense, or else they would soon realise how utterly indefensible their position is).

So, do they have a point when it comes to pounds shillings and pence?  Lets look at just a couple of hard facts.  Even the 2.9 km tunnel is going to cost at least £2billion.  Now that is a big number and I can't imagine what it would look like as a pile of fivers, but is it really excessive in the greater scheme of things?  Well let's compare it with something else equally controversial.

Now I could choose the cost of membership of the EU as the comparator, but the booklet of facts on staying in the EU, or leaving, dropped through the door the other day and when I opened this piece of Tory propaganda, I found all the facts were missing from my copy - and the same was true in every other copy I've looked at, so that isn't going to be overly helpful.   What else might be a good comparator?  Something else that is expensive and controversial - like the UK's Foreign Aid budget.

In 2013, the UK spent 0.7% of GDP, £11.4bn on foreign aid - money spent that does not benefit the UK directly and some would argue is often misspent, maladministered and way to much.  We can point the finger of blame at the Lib-Dems for pushing the 0.7% of GDP target in Parliament.  The Tories and Labour seem happy with the spend, through the Greens would like to increase it to 1% of GDP.  UKIP on the other hand, want to reduce the Foreign Aid budget to 0.2% of GDP and spend the rest within the UK.  In a time of austerity, it's hard to justify spending anything not of direct benefit to UK citizens, but I digress...

Back to a fact or two.   Back in 2014, we gave India £279 million in Foreign Aid and that was 40% down on 2011.   India has its own space program, it has a planned mission to Mars, and the whole program costs £500 million to run per year. So, in bald terms, the money we put into the Indian economy was equivalent to more than 50% of the cost of their entire space program or could have funded 7-8 missions to Mars. We may have been funding it entirely prior to 2011.

Now DfID will argue that the money was targeted on things the Indian's wouldn't have spent their own money on anyway, but the bottom line was that India had a choice on how to spend its money and chose a space program over health and education.   I'm sure a little digging would uncover even more egregious examples, but this one will do for the moment.

So, the 2.9 km Stonehenge tunnel option might cost £2bn at December 2014 prices, but over the 40 years (more like 50, but lets be conservative) that there has been talk of improving the A303, we've probably ploughed a demonstrably un-needed £11.6 billion into Indian Foreign Aid. During the same period, we've probably ploughed close to half a trillion pounds into Foreign Aid in total.

Well, there you have it.  A one-off spend of £2bn on a tunnel for Stonehenge is peanuts in the greater scheme of things and can easily be afforded by cutting the Foreign Aid budget from those countries, like India, that can well-afford to look after their own population's interests, but choose to ignore them.  Of course, digressing again, there are real emergencies and situations that call for Foreign Aid and I wouldn't want to stop that, but we need to spend more wisely.

We have those that walk amongst us who believe a £2 billion tunnel is an extravagance, whilst their political bed-fellows were responsible for the concept of blowing 0.7% of GDP on Foreign Aid without any clear demonstration of need.  I would beg you to treat these people gently; their sanity is surely in question.

Contract awarded for the A303 between Amesbury and Berwick Down (Stonehenge)

There hasn't been a great deal of new information to write about on the A303 improvement scheme in recent months.  That isn't to say that nothing has been going, far from it.  It's a bit like watching swans on a dark, glassy pool.  They move gently and with supreme grace, but you don't see the furious paddling underneath.   So it has been with the A303, with much work and consultation going on in the background.  So it is a great pleasure to be able to record another step forward in the shape of an annoncement from Highways England:

"As part of the £15 billion five year Road Investment Strategy the government has pledged to improve this section of the A303, including a tunnel near Stonehenge and a bypass of the village of Winterbourne Stoke.

Highways England today announced that a package of work with an estimated value of £17.5m has been awarded to Atkins/Arup joint venture to develop options to take to public consultation and ultimately a preferred route announcement. Subject to statutory procedures, the proposed scheme is on target for construction work to start by April 2020.

Project Manager, Andrew Alcorn, leading the A303 Amesbury to Berwick Down scheme, said:

This award takes us another step closer to our commitment to deliver the A303 Amesbury to Berwick Down Improvement Scheme.

Now we have Atkins/Arup on board to help with developing options for the scheme and pre-construction planning, we will be able to take the next step towards making this scheme a reality.

Tony Marshall, Global Highways Business Leader, Arup said:

We are delighted to be a part of the team tasked with helping to relieve congestion and improving the setting of a world renowned heritage site. By working collaboratively we can produce a transport solution that is sensitive to an area that is of immense cultural and environmental importance.

Lesley Waud, Strategic Highways Market Director, Atkins added:

This is a much needed scheme that will play a pivotal role in relieving congestion and improving journey times. We are delighted to work in partnership with Arup in delivering this vital project that will not only generate major benefits to better meet the needs of the travelling public, but will also support local economic growth in the long term.

The contract has been awarded under Highways England’s Collaborative Delivery Framework (CDF). Following the preferred route announcement Highways England will draw up a development consent order application, which will be examined in public by the Planning Inspectorate, before a final decision by the Transport Secretary.

The A303 trunk road links London with the South West and is a key route for long distance commercial and holiday traffic. The scheme will unlock a pinch-point that has restricted the economy of the South West while enhancing the world heritage site at Stonehenge. This scheme is an integral part for creating a A303 ‘expressway’ to the South West region."

We will await further developments with great interest and report them as and when they arise.

Meeting the Minister - A Positive Step Forward

On Monday 3rd August 2015, Stonehenge Traffic Action Group, together with a raft of other stakeholders, were invited to attend a round-table briefing in Amesbury with Andrew Jones MP on the state of play regarding the A303/A30/A358 corridor upgrade plan.

Andrew, in addition to being the MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, is a Parliamentary Under Secretary of State in the Department for Transport with the dubious honour of having the brief to deliver the road investment strategy.  He can't help being a Yorkshireman and from the "wrong" side of the Pennines.

The meeting didn't begin to auspiciously.  Before the Minister arrived, I was accosted by a member of Amesbury Council, who pompously announced that this meeting was very much focusing on Amesbury and the Amesbury end of any road improvements.  As I say, he was a member - of the council.

Thankfully, this wasn't the case, with the Minister making quite clear that he was discussing the entirety of the Countess Roundabout to Berwick Down section of the A303 scheme. 

The meeting demonstrated that most parties understand the vital need to improve the A303, that it is part of the larger corridor plan and to fail to deliver the Stonehenge section would mean the whole strategic plan would fail.  Failure, this time, seems not to be an option - but we've heard similar assurances in the past.

A consensus is building that something has to be done, which in a way is a major step forward.  Stakeholders, STAG included, are holding bilateral meetings with each other to ensure that there are no surprises and issues are dealt with early.  

What were the key points emerging from the meeting?  Well, although there has been much talk of tunnels, nothing is yet set in stone.  Highways England are looking at all the options previously considered, eliminating those that have little chance of success and focusing in on the best option.  They will submit this and all the other information as part of the Development Consent Order process, which replaces a Public Inquiry.  The re will be an examination of the facts and figures in public, but their is no adversarial element to the DCO process.  This process has already begun and should take 5 years to complete.  It clearly involves a heck of a lot of work and Highways England expressed a wish to engage with stakeholders throughout this process.

A lot of key issues were raised.  Perhaps the most important for all locally was what happens between now and when any project comes to fruition.  A lot of the discussion focused on the need to improve both the Countess and Longbarrow roundabouts - neither of which are allowing traffic flow during peak periods and the tailbacks encourage rat running.  The minister seemed to take that on board, though time will tell if they achieve anything.

As far as the Longbarrow to Berwick Down section went, they are focusing on the northern route (ie north of the current A303).  Those representing Winterbourne Stoke pointed out that we expected a lot more consideration being given to sound-proofing the section that ran across the Till valley to protect the village from road noise.  It was noted that the previous scheme involved raising the road on a causeway - bizarre given the history of the River Till - which was no longer acceptable.  It had been done to try and get rid of a lot of the spoil from the previously planned tunnel.  We raised the issue of the phosphatic chalk discovered along the possible tunnel route and the suggestion that disturbing it might release radon.  It was clear that both Andrew Jones and Highways England were well aware of this and they commented that appropriate ways of disposing of such material would need to be found.

The only question that Highways England didn't answer, in fact they were told NOT to answer it by Andrew Jones, was one we asked for information.  We asked how deep the tunnel might be, below ground level, at two points:  Stonehenge Bottom and at its closest predicted point to Stonehenge itself.  We indicated that at this early stage, we weren't after specifics; just a general indication of depth - were we talking a metre, 10 metres or 100 metres.   Given that Highways England have been talking about a tunnel 2.9km long - not 2 to 3 km but 2.9km, we do find it a little bit odd that they aren't prepared to give a similarly important estimate on depth at this stage.  At the end of the day, the depth of the excavation for the tunnel roof is going to be the measurement that is going to have to be defended the most in terms of the probability, or not, of damaging as yet undiscovered buried features.  Like the tunnel length, this sort of discussion is best started early, so at least the most specious arguments are rapidly surfaced and dismissed.

The only note of dissent came from Amesbury Abbey, in relation to how Highways England might change the Countess Roundabout as part of the overall scheme.  The suggestion was that the A303 would cross above the A345 at a raised level.  The objection here was that this would increase sound levels experienced by elderly residents of Amesbury Abbey.  A rational concern, but one which could surely be alleviated by careful screening and road surface selection?  Like many of the possible concerns, lets get them out in the open now, identify solutions and move on.  Throwing Teddy's in corners will get us nowhere fast.

We all know it isn't going to be easy; there are a lot of vested interests.  There are some for whom no compromise is acceptable and yet compromise we must have - the transport needs of the living and for generations yet to come have to be balanced with the need for preservation of things built by generations long dead, and quality of life has to be balanced with improved access to part of mankind's rich heritage.  It's a huge, huge ask, but we are prepared to play our part in building the consensus that is needed to make this work.

It rather begs the question, dear reader.  Are YOU?

Easter Hell Predicted For the A303

Oh great British travelling public.  Consider yourselves warned.  Just don't come this way this Easter.  The A303 is predicted to be the number one traffic blackspot in the UK.

If you do ignore all the advice, then be prepared to camp in your cars for the holiday.

Dan Snow, The History Man, Spouting Nonsense As Fast As He Can!

Oh dear, what a performance.  Back on Tuesday, 17th March 2015,  the Stonehenge Alliance (aka the Stonehenge Aliens), a somewhat befuddled collective of the well-meaning, but easily confused,  pitched up at Byway 12, near to Stonehenge, to launch their campaign and showcase their tame celebrity - Dan Snow, the History Man.

 
Now whilst there were a few journalists around to witness events, the biggest Press presence was that of the BBC in the form of Paul Clifton, BBC South Today's traffic correspondent and local resident with a camera crew.  Now it must be said that Paul has been scrupulously impartial in his reporting of issues surrounding the A303 at Stonehenge; often to the frustration of us members of STAG.

I was curious to understand the ethics of the BBC interviewing Dan Snow - who seems to do rather a lot of TV and book work for them.  That's perhaps a point for others, particularly BBC management, to ponder.  Perhaps, to restore confidence in their impartiality, they might want to consider getting Jeremy Clarkson and the Top Gear team to do a bit of off-roading through the World Heritage Site (WHS)?  Then again, given the current fuss about Jezza, perhaps not...

...but Captain Slow and the Hamster would suffice!

If you want to read a bit more about the nonsense Dan Snow and the Stonehenge Aliens were putting forward during his interviews, you can read it here on our sister blog for the Stonehenge Traffic Action Group. The key message seems to be that they want to persuade UNESCO to put pressure on the government to abandon plans for a tunnel under Stonehenge.  Indeed, Dan Snow was, apparently, pushing the line that he would prefer to leave the A303 in its current undualed state past Stonehenge rather than put it into a tunnel that might at least remove a view of the road from a large part of the WHS and achieve one of UNESCO's aims for the WHS.

Part of the problem when talking to the Stonehenge Aliens is that they can't seem to come up with a collective story about what they actually want.  Some want to remove the A303 entirely from the WHS landscape, others want to ban a tunnel at all costs for fear it would: alter the water table, cause Stonehenge to sink into the ground/fall over, attract aliens, cause Salisbury Cathedral to flood, add to global warming and increase the cost of cheese.  Please delete or add to these scare stories as appropriate.  A few of them seem to support the idea of a dual-carriageway tunnel, providing it starts and ends outside the WHS.  However, few of the latter have thought through their argument.  Whilst the present WHS has clear boundaries, some leeway should be given to the possibility of further, related,  archaeological discoveries beyond the present confines of the WHS; particularly between the two geographical features that define the sitelines to the east and the west - Beacon Hill on the Hampshire/Wiltshire border and Little Down, west of Yarnbury Castle where Salisbury Plain falls away towards Deptford - we'll come back to this a bit later.

 Living in Winterbourne Stoke, the NIMBY in me says that I too would prefer to remove the A303 from the landscape - either by routing it miles to the north, or stuffing it into a very long tunnel that goes under the village and Stonehenge.  Unfortunately, many in the Stonehenge Alliance are so fixated on preserving the past, that they cannot entertain the needs of the present or the future.  Nor can may of them contemplate the need for pragmatism and compromise - nor cost.  Whilst the Chancellor might have announced that austerity was over in yesterday's budget, he didn't mean he had a bottomless purse to improve the A303.

It's perhaps worth raising a few key points here.  First, the Stonehenge Alliance are objecting to a plan that doesn't yet exist in any real detail.  All we know so far is that the government have set aside £1.3 billion for a tunnel, which they suggest would be a minimum of 2.8km (1.8 miles) long.  That sounds a lot of money, but when you consider the Lærdal Tunnel in Norway, currently the World's longest road tunnel at 24.5km , cost only £150 million between 1995 and 2000 - then £1.3 billion might buy a bit more than 2.9 km of tunnel!

Second, UNESCO love tunnels - Fact.  Only two sites in the world have ever lost WHS status.  One in Oman which was de-listed at the request of the Omani government and the second was in Dresden in relation to a site near the River Elbe.  The Dresden authorities wanted to improve the flow of traffic over the Elbe, UNESCO were against a bridge and proposed a tunnel instead, the Dresden authoriies stuck two fingers in the air and built the bridge anyway.  As a consequence, UNESCO finally delisted the WHS in June 2009.  So, the good news is, it's hard to see how UNESCO could possibly favour leaving the current A303 in the WHS, when even a short tunnel could improve the landscape.

Third, if by some chance Stonehenge Alliance kick up enough of a fuss to gain UNESCO attention and overturn UNESCO's preference for hiding obtrusive roads underground, then UNESCO may choose to make the threat of removal of WHS status - it could happen.  The next UK government, sniffing the prospect of a massive cash saving, may be tempted to call UNESCO's bluff and get the Stonehenge WHS de-listed.  A massive own-goal for the Stonehenge Alliance and a slap in the face of STAG and the local population who wish to both improve the current road situation and conserve the WHS.  No doubt the Aliens will point out that the land either side of the A303 is owned by the National Trust and is inviolate.  That is true.  It is equally true that a determined government, even a coalition, could overturn such protection for the greater good of the nation and build an on-line dual carriageway.  Now whilst such a cheap and cheerful option would be very popular to some in the local community and those who travel the route daily from further afield, I would find the prospect horrific.  Whilst I don't believe this is a credible or realistic option, it is possible.  To my mind, it is also the worst possible outcome for the WHS.

Fourth, whilst I and others might share the wish that the A303 could be re-routed outside the WHS (as it is now, now or as it might one day be expanded to be),  that isn't on offer. Period, full-stop.It is NOT on offer.

There is another option which might just achieve everyone's aims.  Indeed, I suggested it to Dan Snow just before his interview with Paul Clifton.  Dan had, quite rightly in my view, expressed the most sensible thing he said all morning.  That was his belief that the Stonehenge WHS had a unique national, indeed global, significance and value and should be protected.  I suggested that we could test this shared view in a very pragmatic way: set up a public subscription, as the Victorians used to do to fund major works.  The international response to the subscription appeal would prove once and for all whether the concept of the Stonehenge WHS had any value at all.  Do people really value their heritage?  If not' let's just proceed as has been proposed.

Of course, let's not forget the fact that last August, Dan Snow and his wife, the heiress Lady Edwina Grosvenor, the second child of the Duke of Westminster, intimated that they don't want any possible inheritance to be a burden to their children and might give it away to charity.  Admirable stuff that.  Now, the Duke of Westminster is pretty high up the UK rich list and has a bob or two, an estimated fortune of about £8.5 billion.  That would buy an awful lot of tunnel - about 17.5 km.  Perhaps the idea of a "Duke of WestminsterGlobal Heritage Tunnel" might be an appealing legacy - especially to someone who made their fortune because of land? 

Going back to my earlier point of a long tunnel that crossed the current and any probable future sitelines of an expanded WHS, then the Duke of Westminster's legacy could easily pay for the 13.5 km of tunnel needed to cross the obvious geographical features and still leave some pocket money for the children and grandchildren.  It's just a suggestion and I wouldn't want the Westminster's to feel under any obligation...

I think, however, it is only fair to leave the last word to the "opposition" - the Stonehenge Alliance...

...as they clearly suggest here. Please contact UNESCO and show your support for dualling the A303 - preferably in a tunnel!  You should also sign up to the STAG campaign!

Tutt Tutt - Blinkered Views and Lack of Academic Rigour

In the last post, we suggested that the fruit-loops were coming out to play, as indeed some did.  This month has seen a bunch of academics and antiquarians pushing the most egregious example of illogical thinking I have seen in a long time.

Today, the Daily Telegraph carried an article about three such individuals, Mr David Jacques of the University of Buckingham, Prof Tim Darvill of Bournemouth University and Andy Rhind-Tutt of the Amesbury Museum and Heritage Trust spouting an awful lot of claptrap-dressed up as science regarding the discovery of the latest-dated Mesolithic encampment ever found in the UK at a site a mile and a half to the south of Stonehenge at a place called Blick Mead.  Indeed, if I was a Vice Chancellor at either of these universities I would be asking some serious questions about the logical reasoning abilities and lack of academic rigour of some of my staff.

There is no doubt that the discovery at Blick Mead is interesting, it certainly is, but the arguments put forward by the academics are facile and disingenuous in the extreme.  Firstly. they posit that the proposed A303 tunnel, a mile and half away, is going to have an instant and massive detrimental effect to the archaeology, whereas the 6,000 years of development much closer to the Blick Mead site, and also impacting on the local water table - such as construction and redevelopment of the town of Amesbury itself, the massive developments at Solstice Park the runway at Boscombe Down (to be fair, 2 miles from Blick Mead) and even the A303 itself - have had no discernible impact on the archaeology.

Second, even if a tunnel were to adversely impact on this new archaeology, does it matter?  Well, only if the periods of history and pre-history favoured by Jacques, Darvill and Rhind-Tutt are the be-all-and-end-all of archaeology; which of course they are not.  The reality is very different of course, as everything that happened prior to you reading this line, happened in the past - whether it it was 10,000 years ago or 10 femtoseconds ago - it is all worthy of study by archaeologists.  All of it is important and all of it valuable, but to suggest one element is more important than another is arrogance in the extreme.  Importance is purely a matter of opinion - not fact.

Third, as someone with an interest in more recent history, I could equally argue that the role of the World Heritage Site and its environs, from 1914 to the present day, is of much greater national and international importance because of its involvement in WWI and WWII and thus national survival and the preservation of the free-world, than are any other events or structures in the area. I could argue that, but my argument would be as irrelevant and ill-considered as the arguments of Jacques, Darvill and Rhind Tutt.

You could look at all this another way - and perhaps we should.  Things that are planned and built today become the archaeological sites of tomorrow.  That would, of course, include any tunnel to bypass Stonehenge.  It's fame is already global and it isn't yet built.  Picture a time several thousand years past when someone had the inspiration to build something unique in wood on a greenfield site north west of Amesbury.  There were probably a bunch of naysayers complaining about loss of open-space amenities such as grazing or hunting, and their descendants millennia later were still bitching on about the evils of change when the wood was replaced with stone and the stones were re-arranged.  Change never suits everyone.

However, if it wasn't for change, for man shaping his environment to meet his current and future needs, there would be no science of archaeology at all.  Ironic that isn't it; the obsession with preserving the past prevents change and the creation of history.

It also means that, no matter where you were to stuff the A303 - along, its current line, or north, or south of it, it is going to affect some archaeology, all of it important to someone - unless it goes through somewhere that has never felt the touch of the hand of man.  To be honest, the only place where this can be pretty much guaranteed in the WHS is - yes - underground.  A tunnel of such magnificent proportions that it dwarfs its antecedents - a man-made wonder of the 21st century and piece of premier archaeology of the future.  What better legacy for a World Heritage Site.

Now, how about the red algae, Hildenbrandia rivularis, found at Blick Mead that gives the flint a pink appearance.  It's unusual in the UK, but it is found throughout Europe and beyond, most frequently, it would seem, in countries and regions with a high degree of forestation and little farming.  That rather begs the question if the reason it is so unusual in the UK is simply down to the level of deforestation and agriculture.  When you dig a little deeper into the story, yet again, there is a degree of selectivity in the facts that are presented.  Yes, Hildenbrandia rivularis is very dependent on warmish hard water, but it is also very, very sensitive to phosphate levels in the water, phosphates that are applied to farmland all around Stonehenge, phosphates that arise from human and animal waste across the catchment area, phosphates that leach out of graveyards often located close to streams and rivers.  Perhaps we should replant Salisbury Plain with trees,  depopulate the whole area, disinter the dead and ban all forms of farming?

There is an even more bizarre possible explanation for Hildenbrandia rivularis being at Blick Mead - the building of Stonehenge itself.  How is that possible?  Well, when you look at the distribution of this algae round the UK, it is most common in Yorkshire and the east and west of Wales.  The map below shows the distribution, though apologies for the small size of the dots.  I'm sure you will note that the sites in west Wales are very close to Carn Goedog, the site of origin of Stonehenge's Blue stones.  So, there is a chance that the Hildenbrandia rivularis hitched a ride on the stones as they made their way the 160 miles to Stonehenge.  That would, of course, mean they are an introduced species and, some would say, ought to be exterminated.

As for Mr Rhind-Tutt and his tall tale of a "tunnel with one exit lane."  It exists only in the convoluted recesses of his imagination.  But if the government could construct the the tunnel 4 lanes in each direction instead of the proposed 2, for the same £1.3bn, most of the folks in the local area will be well-pleased.

Banish Bypass Bullshit

One of the things we have always been aware of is just how emotive the whole issue of the A303 and the World Heritage Site is.  The positive news (to us) of funding being found for the A303 and a tunnel to get it through the World Heritage Site, as well as the bypass for Winterbourne Stoke and all the other beleaguered communities along its route is seen as an announcement about the end of the world by a few.

Some of them are genuinely concerned but ill-informed, others appear to be one slice short of a sandwich and some appear to be simply malicious.  The one thing that many of them have in common is their propensity to spout nonsense and live in a world where financial constraints, employment, health, public opinion and the laws of nature have no meaning.

From the moment we started this blog, our stated intention was to challenge factual inaccuracies, cant or hyperbole when it came to all issues relating to the A303.  We've done so without fear, or favour, and have regularly taken to task English Heritage, the Highways Agency and Wiltshire Council.

Given some of the comments that we and other STAG members have received over the last 24 hours it is clear that this sort of effort is going to be needed more than ever now there seems to be a fairly strong possibility of the work going ahead.  So today, we announce the start of our "Banish Bypass Bullshit" campaign.
 

So, every time our attention is drawn to those seeking to halt the A303 improvements by use of bullshit, we will seek out those experts who can provide the facts and hard evidence that will rebut their specious claims and publish it.  What we want is evidence and fact, not ill-informed opinion or outright bigotry.  Of course, we have a heart and when we come across those who are, quite clearly, in need of professional help of a type we cannot provide, we promise to gently help steer them towards the arms of those who can.

Already we have seen some odd statements from the sort of folk who were against digging the channel tunnel in case the roof caved in and southern England got flooded, or against driving at all because such speeds would stop us breathing.  If you qualify as one of these people or organisations, we are on your case!