News / Environment
Tree-top protest against Bristol MetroBus
Campaigners have created a tree-top camp in protest at the creation of a MetroBus route through Stapleton.
Contractors were due to start felling trees on land bordering the land off Frenchay Park Road this week, to clear the land for the new bus route.
However, a group of protesters have scaled the trees and established an impromptu camp in the tree tops to prevent the land clearance going ahead. Bailiffs, believed to be hired by Bristol City Council, and the police were on hand but the campaigners are still understood to be occupying the trees this evening.
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Land bordering the route is leased by the Avon Wildlife Trust from Bristol City Council and is used as allotments and community food growing project by Feed Bristol.
Part of the land earmarked for the MetroBus scheme has already been taken back into council control and, although the Trust will continue to operate out of the land bordering the project, some of the allotments and trees bordering the project will be lost.
Robin Maynard from the Avon Wildlife Trust said: “Any piece of habitat is valuable to wildlife..so we would prefer if the trees remain and that is why Avon Wildlife Trust objected to the MetroBus scheme. Planning permission has gone ahead so we presume trees will be removed.”
Belinda Faulkes, a volunteer and spokesperson for Rising Up, said they are “not prepared to sit back and let this happen” and they are still hoping to find “possible alternatives to the route”.
“It will damage our green spaces and offer very low benefits for an extremely expensive scheme…The predictions for passenger numbers are extremely low – less than 300 in a rush hour morning.”
None of the protesters in the trees would give a statement to Bristol 24/7, although it’s believe they are not members of Feed Bristol.
Supporters of the MetroBus network say the routes will ” link key areas through a modern public transport network that is faster, more reliable, and more comfortable than existing bus services”.
However, Pip Sheard from Alliance to Rethink MetroBus said: “The Stapleton tree felling is the start of a year of Metrobus environmental vandalism. Each month will bring fresh damage and loss to our local green spaces’
She added: “The Alliance to rethink Metrobus fully support today’s peaceful direct action being taken by local residents to prevent the felling of trees at Stapleton allotments.”
However, Faulkes said that the Avon Wildlife Trust had “worked closely” with Bristol City Council and the trees will be replace with native species which “in the long term will offer better conservation value and that is our aim”.
Bristol 24/7 have contacted Bristol City Council for comment.
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