Landscapes Under Threat - Arundel Bypass
Photo:
Kriptick
The Highways Agency is currently doing studies which could result in a road scheme at Arundel.
Situated on the A27 - the main trunk road along the south coast – Arundel suffers from the continuing increase in traffic pollution. Even in 1070 - the year that Roger de Montgomery founded Arundel Castle - traffic was a problem. That time it was river traffic as well as road, as Arundel sits conveniently on the river Arun and in those times of invasion and battles it was quite a chaotic place.
Arundel campaigned successfully for a bypass after road traffic increased as a result of Beeching cuts in the rail network. This was built around 1970. However Arundel's relief was soon overtaken by gloom, as the capacity of the A27 either side of the bypass was steadily increased with the upgrading of the road to dual carriageway
So what's the plan? Well of course the pressure is on to build another bypass - the infamous 'bypass of the bypass'. South Coast Against Roadbuilding believes that the environmental cost is too great and any gain of reduced traffic congestion will soon be lost as the extra road capacity is filled by induced traffic. A more sustainable approach would be to reduce the need to commute by car. Public transport must be made more user-friendly and the need to commute to work over greater and greater distances reversed.
This picture shows campaigners in 2003 walking the proposed route of the second Arundel bypass, which included plans to take the road across the water meadow in the distance on 30 metre high stilts or an embankment . That proposal has been shelved but, unless there is significant opposition, another one may well be on its way.
South Coast Against Roadbuilding (SCAR) is an umbrella group to local groups fighting the threat of more road building. See www.scar-uk.fsnet.co.uk