Graeme Wall wrote:
On 29/01/2021 09:23, wrote:
On Thu, 28 Jan 2021 17:17:11 +0000
Graeme Wall wrote:
On 28/01/2021 11:26, wrote:
On Thu, 28 Jan 2021 11:11:45 +0000
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 10:49:46 on Thu, 28 Jan
2021, remarked:
Of all the places to prevent HS2 construction happening, Euston would be
right at the bottom of my list. Ancient woodland I can understand but
Euston
hasn't been a pleasent cityscape since the 1970s.
I think you'll find that these people mistakenly believe that their
attempts to sabotage the OOC-Euston part of HS2 will result in the
entire project being cancelled.
They're not stupid and know that won't happen so I don't understand what
they're doing. If you're protesting in some woodland or about some trees
there's a reasonable chance you might have some effect and the route is
diverted slightly, its happened in the past with various road projects. But
nothing is going to stop construction at Euston so ... wtf?
It's all about self-publicity.
Possibly, but if that was the case why was it all hush hush until they were
rumbled? Unless they planned a big Ta-da! reveal at some point. To me it
seems they've expended all that effort digging tunnels for no gain
whatsoever - they'd have got far more publicity just blocking euston road
holding some placards for a morning.
But that's not what they do, this way they get more individual publicity
when they finally reveal themselves. which is what they want, they are
not actually intersted in the notional cause they are supporting. It was
the same with the Newbury by-pass protesters who went on and on about
the rare plants that were being destroyed and then went and camped on
the site of the largest colony of the rarest plants because they didn't
know, or care, what they were.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/hs2-protesters-create-trouble-for-wildlife-n7qdkwppl?shareToken=51460a093ae53a7c105083244c17c 4be
Protesters trying to stop the HS2 rail line destroying a nature reserve
have been accused of polluting a river beside their camp and scaring off
its wildlife.
The HS2 Rebellion camp at Denham Country Park, on the western edge of
London, is on the bank of the River Colne. The surrounding nature reserve
is home to endangered water voles and rich in biodiversity.
However, river quality tests downstream have had their worst results since
the camp expanded last summer. Park volunteers believe the river was
polluted by activists washing their clothes with detergents, or themselves
with soap and shampoo, and chemical run-off from dumped pallets used to
build camp structures.
Water voles, the fastest declining mammal in Britain, are one of the
species that protesters want to protect. But volunteers in the park say
camp fires near their burrow scared off the voles.
Mark Swaby, fishery manager at the country park, said: “There was a water
vole burrow. When the protesters arrived, tents were put up and fires were
lit, one of which was right above the water vole burrow. Needless to say
the water voles moved away. Then in November they were walking around
asking walkers if they had seen any water voles.”
While HS2 Rebellion’s website says activists established the camp to “halt
work, monitor and report wildlife crimes and bear witness to HS2’s ecocide
of the priority habitat wet woodland”, park volunteers believe the camp has
done little to prevent work on the high-speed line — but a lot to damage
wildlife. The camp made headlines in December when the veteran eco-warrior
Daniel Hooper, 47, known as Swampy, was evicted from a bamboo tower built
over the river.
River quality sample tests at a site downstream from the camp typically
find thousands of small invertebrates, such as freshwater shrimp and
mayflies. However, testing in September, when the camp was full, detected
no flies, suggesting they had been killed off by chemicals. A second test
was done two days later and still found nothing. The latest test in
November, when the camp population had shrunk, found a small number of
flies but still fell below the trigger point that suggests a pollution
event.
The test samples were taken from a shallow area of a ford below the
protesters’ camp but upstream from the HS2 compound. Because pollution
rarely travels upstream, and seemed confined to the part of the river near
the camp, volunteers are convinced that it was caused by protesters rather
than HS2.
Eddie Edwards, a local river monitor for the Riverfly Partnership, an
umbrella organisation to protect rivers’ water quality that did the tests,
was one of the team that took the samples in September and November. He
said they had been “horrified” by the results. Asked if he thought the
protest camp was responsible, he said: “Much as I hate to say it, yes.”