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53-546: At a time of rapidly rising concerns about the effect of road transport on the environment, and in particular from the program of road building which had resulted in major road protests, at Twyford Down and other locations, the Conservatives under John Major introduced a 'Fuel Price Escalator' in March 1993 set initially at 3% ahead of inflation per year, increased to 5% later in the same year, and then increased again to 6% in 1997 by

106-561: A Site of Special Scientific Interest . It is managed by Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust . Much of the site is chalk grassland , supporting the uncommon chalkhill blue butterfly. Where grazing has kept the grass short, the grassland is dominated by sheep's fescue grass, accompanied by lime-loving (calcicolous) plants such as common rock-rose , salad burnet , thyme , horseshoe vetch , kidney vetch , fairy flax , clustered bellflower , and orchids such as autumn lady's tresses and frog orchid . The north-facing side of

159-469: A saddle quern , objects of worked bronze, iron, bone, and stone, as well as whetstones , spindle whorls , and remains of bones of sheep/goat, shorthorn oxen, horses, pigs, red deer, and dogs. From the Roman period there is pottery, a bronze coin of the emperor Carausius , and a bronze fibula . At the top of the hill, a copse of beech trees contains the site of the 12th-century chapel of St. Catherine . In

212-579: A counterscarp bank. At the north-east side is an original entrance, with the rampart turned inwards. There is no evidence of an initial wooden rampart, unlike some other hillforts in Wessex . In the Middle Iron Age, c. 400–300 BC, the fortifications were made higher and the entrance was reshaped. The site was occupied until the Middle Ages , as demonstrated by archaeological finds such as Iron Age pottery,

265-450: A fort and a chapel, as well as being a 17th and 18th century coaching route. In 1991, the down was the site of a major road protest against a section of the M3 motorway from London to the south coast of England. There had been plans since the 1970s to replace the 1930s Winchester bypass which was regularly congested due to design features that had become out of date. This was problematic owing to

318-475: A log of events. He used this log when defending other protesters in court. He visited those who had been imprisoned and helped establish a legal precedent of the right for protesters and demonstrators to have a witness while being questioned. Several artists, such as Jill Bray (b.1936) marked their protest by creating work based on the Twyford Down landscape. In 1995, the motorway section through Twyford Down

371-573: A petition of 19,000, of which 11,227 were Winchester residents. The group was also active in distributing leaflets to the local community. In March 1992, two travellers pitched a camp on the down, and discovered from local ramblers about the Bar End to Compton contract, meaning the land they were sitting on would soon be excavated. In response, noting that public inquiries had failed to stop construction, they decided to gather support. Environmental organisations attempted to take Department for Transport to

424-528: A private members' club on the down in 1914. Outline strategic planning for the route of what was to be later known as the M3 motorway had begun in the late 1930s. The route was to link London to Basingstoke , in order to reduce the pressure on the A30 . Detailed planning for the first phase of construction, a 40 miles (64 km) section, between Sunbury on Thames and Popham , began in 1962-3. The 26 miles (42 km) section, between Lightwater and Popham, where

477-468: A protester was manhandled by five officers. Another protester, according to a report by local MP John Denham , was strangled by officers and left unconscious on top of the Down for 30 minutes. Maggie Lambert, then a mature photography student, took numerous photographs of the protest, and challenged an injunction which suggested she had been involved with direct action . While Lord Justice Mann admitted there

530-494: A recommendation to complete the M3 through Twyford Down. Following the completion of the motorway to Bar End in the summer of 1985, the junction at Hockley was the only set of traffic lights between London and Southampton. The Ministry of Transport (MoT) had problems purchasing the land required to complete the route past Winchester. The land required, east of the city on Twyford Down, was owned by Winchester College, which refused to sell

583-659: A time of rapidly increasing oil prices, George Osborne cut 1p from the tax, increased the Petroleum Revenue Tax to raise at additional £2bn from North Sea oil firms, and announced that the escalator would be replaced with a 'fuel price stabiliser'. but would rise if oil prices fell below $ 75 per barrel . In the 2011 budget the Chancellor had also announced a rise of 1p in January 2012 and then 5p in August 2013, but later cancelled

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636-484: A time of record low oil prices, the chancellor froze fuel duty for the sixth year running, and reduced the tax on North Sea oil firms. Twyford Down Twyford Down is an area of chalk downland lying directly to the southeast of Winchester , Hampshire , England next to St. Catherine's Hill and close to the South Downs National Park . It has been settled since pre- Roman times, and has housed

689-485: A wider range of classes of people than had previously been the case, and included physical violence from onsite security officers. The motorway was completed as planned and provides a link of continuous motorway between Greater London and the South Coast ports. Nevertheless, the protests attracted interest from the national media, and drew attention to this form of campaigning. Subsequent road schemes took greater account of

742-512: Is a chalk downland hill and 43-hectare (110-acre) biological Site of Special Scientific Interest on the outskirts of Winchester in Hampshire , England. It is owned by Winchester College but open to the public. It is managed by Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust , and topped by an Iron Age hillfort, a scheduled monument . In the Black Death , plague pits were dug in the dry valley on

795-458: The Blair ministry after Labour won power. The last rise due to the escalator took place following the budget on 9 March 1999 at a time of rapidly increasing oil prices. In 2000 at a time of rising protests at the cost of fuel Gordon Brown announced that the prices would only be increased by inflation due to the high price of oil . Increases were deferred for a number of budgets and then in 2011, at

848-523: The Campaign for Better Transport in 2007. Veteran road protester Chris Gillham believes that his efforts in protesting against Twyford Down, where he took an active role in confronting security officers and crawling under razor wire, helped later road schemes, such as the Hindhead Tunnel to be planned with greater consideration about the environment. In 2012, several of the original protesters returned to

901-466: The Chalkhill Blue butterfly, extinct, putting a highly visible scar on the landscape, and that they believed the new motorway would not adequately resolve traffic problems. Protesters demonstrated their opposition to the road's construction by blocking the path of construction equipment. They were met by security officers from Group 4 . In December 1992, in view of a film crew from The Observer ,

954-552: The High Court , stating that the road was against the government's own environmental protection laws. The European Commission dropped its objections that August. David Croker , who had become head of the protest group Twyford Down Association, said they "had come to depend on the European Commission so we're very disappointed." The principal arguments of the protesters were their concern about making wildlife species, such as

1007-515: The River Itchen . The soil on the hill is a thin dark rendzina , directly on top of the chalk; it is thinnest high on the slopes, thickening into the valleys . This provides a varied set of local environments supporting a range of communities of flowering plants, including small populations of numerous downland species of orchids. Species uncommon for southern England include bastard toadflax and juniper . The hill has accordingly been designated

1060-569: The Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), and went to a public inquiry in 1985, where the then Planning Officer of Winchester City Council described the route as "bold" and an "imaginative solution" In February 1992, the M3 was improved between Southampton and Compton, and soon afterwards work began on clearing the route across the down. Part of the contract stipulated that the old bypass would be removed and restored to nature, restoring direct access to St. Catherine's Hill. We respectfully petition

1113-455: The 14th century, Black Death , bubonic plague killed many people in the area. Plague pits were dug in the dry valley beside the hill when all Winchester's graveyards became full. There is a mizmaze near the hilltop copse , probably cut between 1647 and 1710 in the Early modern period. It was remade between 1830 and 1840. Winchester College pupils and teachers assemble twice a year, early in

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1166-460: The 1930s, a by-pass was planned to the east of the city, passing immediately west of St. Catherine's Hill , opening to traffic on 1 February 1940. Construction of this had been controversial as it affected the Itchen Valley and offered only a partial solution to congestion, with some people calling instead for a by-pass to the north and west of Winchester. As a 1930s road construction project,

1219-529: The 1p rise and reduced the 5p August rise to 3p in November 2012. In the budget of 2012 Osborne confirmed the 3p August rise, before first postponing it and then cancelling it in December 2012. A further proposed inflation-based increase in fuel duty was cancelled by the chancellor in March 2013. In March 2016, with oil prices at about $ 40 a barrel, and following widespread speculation that the duty would be increased at

1272-479: The 3rd century, a fort was constructed on the hill, while in the 12th, a Norman chapel was constructed on the site. During the Middle Ages , paths along the down formed part of the Pilgrim's Trail from Winchester to Normandy via Portsmouth . This is commemorated by the modern Pilgrims' Trail which crosses the down. In 1675, John Ogilby noted that the main coaching route from London to Southampton ran over

1325-636: The A30 and the A303 separated, opened in June 1971; this was followed by the Sunbury to Lightwater section which opened in July 1974. The second phase was to extend the motorway 10 miles (16 km) southwards between Popham and Winchester, ending at Compton . Planning began with the first public inquiry which was held in 1971, to set the line of the motorway , and this second section

1378-575: The City Council to heed the strength of the case against the M3 and by vote in Council to rescind their previous support for the motorway between Popham and Compton. Petition from the M3 Joint Action Group to Winchester City Council Protests against the completion of the M3 had been ongoing since 1973, with the formation of the M3 Joint Action Group by David Pare . The group gathered together

1431-439: The M3. The Rev. Michael Till explained that "the noise comes beaming straight across The Close. It does change life having a perpetual background noise". Also in that year, veterans of a Twyford Down protest threatened a new campaign of direct action in response to 200 new road-building proposals in the government's recently unveiled ten-year transport plan. Rebecca Lush went on to found Road Block in 2005, which became part of

1484-523: The Twyford Down cutting, the pace of road construction in the United Kingdom slowed. In 1994, a government committee concluded that building more roads would only encourage more traffic, and that the way to ease congestion and pollution was to take measures to control car use rather than accommodate more. When Labour came to power in 1997, many road schemes were cancelled. In 2000, campaigners mounted legal action to preserve an area of grassland created on

1537-433: The area which is renowned for its dramatic rolling scenery and ecologically rich grassland. Its history can be traced back to pre-Roman times. Along it run a series of trackways known as "dongas", which resulted from farmers herding animals to surrounding markets. St Catherine's Hill , in the centre of the down has been identified as a human settlement more than 3,000 years ago and pre-dates the foundation of Winchester . In

1590-457: The bypass also reduced traffic volumes from the village of Twyford and removed the road that separated St. Catherine's Hill from the city. When interviewed for The Independent , local residents said the latter had transformed the place, one adding "St. Catherine's Hill used to be cut off from Winchester by the A33. Now there's open, peaceful countryside. It's wonderful." Soon after the construction of

1643-559: The bypass was built to then-contemporary standards, including at-grade crossings at Bar End and at Hockley. As time progressed, the bypass became more and more of a bottleneck as roads around it were improved to higher standards, particularly after the opening of the A33 Chandler's Ford Bypass in 1968 and the A34 King's Worthy Link the following year, which meant all long distance traffic, as opposed to merely that from London to Southampton,

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1696-507: The chalk hills on its east by the M3 motorway . That road, built in the 1990s, aroused the Twyford Down protests . St. Catherine's Hill is geologically within the upfolding of the chalk called the Winchester anticline . The anticline has eroded to expose older rocks to the north of the hill, with a surviving inward-facing circular escarpment encompassing St. Catherine's and other hills to

1749-459: The chalk, which results in a thin dark soil, a rendzina , which favours lime-loving plants from orchids to bellflowers. The top of St. Catherine's Hill is ringed by the ramparts of an Iron Age hillfort, a Scheduled Monument . The fortifications consist of a single rampart (univallate dump or glacis ) with an outer ditch, begun in the Early Iron Age; much of the way around there is also

1802-627: The city. These proposals had gone through two public inquiries in 1971 and 1976, respectively. The first in 1971, the line order inquiry, had considered the proposed route of the motorway; and in 1973 the government approved this route. The second inquiry, in 1976, was to consider both the stopping up of side roads and the compulsory purchase orders for the land needed to build the motorway. The latter inquiry in particular had drawn significant objection from protesters, including masters from Winchester College . Morgan-Giles argued in Parliament to support

1855-575: The college. The hill remains in the college's ownership, but is open to the public. When the Didcot, Newbury and Southampton Railway was built in the 1890s, it separated the hill from the water meadows in the Itchen valley. The 1930s construction of the Winchester By-pass increased the severance . The hill has been rejoined to the city and college by the removal of the road, but it has been severed from

1908-623: The down to hold a 20th anniversary celebration of the protest. Twyford Down became part of the western extremity of the South Downs National Park in 2011, having previously been designated as part of the East Hampshire AONB (Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty). The acid jazz band Galliano released a 1994 single "Twyford Down" in response to the M3 road building. St. Catherine%27s Hill, Hampshire 51°02′47″N 01°18′38″W  /  51.04639°N 1.31056°W  / 51.04639; -1.31056 St. Catherine's Hill

1961-503: The dry valley beside the hill is covered with taller grasses such as meadow fescue and upright brome, accompanied by taller forbs such as basil , betony , wild carrot , yellow rattle , and perforate St John's wort . A feature of the plant community is the presence of forbs of relatively wet grassland, such as saw-wort , hemp agrimony , and devilsbit scabious . There is some invasive scrub with bushes such as hawthorn , blackthorn , privet , dogwood , and wild rose , especially on

2014-484: The environment or were cancelled. Several protesters at Twyford Down subsequently formed campaign groups, or joined existing ones such as the Campaign for Better Transport . Twyford Down sits to the southeast of Winchester and the northeast of Twyford, and is part of the Winchester-East Meon Anticline . The down's 142-metre (466 ft) summit, known as Deacon Hill, is towards the north-eastern edge of

2067-465: The lack of available land between Winchester College and St. Catherine's Hill. After several public inquiries, particularly with using the water meadows near the college, a route was chosen that took the motorway over the down in a cutting. Although protests against the M3 had been ongoing since the early 1970s, the protest-action on top of the down, described in 1994 as the most controversial British motorway project ever to start construction, attracted

2120-471: The land to the government because part was a water meadow . The desired route, however, had been chosen to avoid St. Catherine's Hill, and pass to the south. Proposals were made for a tunnel through Twyford Down, but the estimated cost for this was £ 75 million more than the estimated cost for a cutting, and the government dismissed the plans. The final route chosen ran to the south of St. Catherine's Hill, taking 1.91 hectares (4.7 acres) (approximately 4.5%) of

2173-404: The morning, on top of the hill in one of its customs , "Morning Hills"; this is the only regular whole-school assembly practised by the college. The game of Winchester College football was formerly played on top of the hill; boys who were not playing stood beside the pitch to keep the ball from rolling down the hill. In 1922, The Old Wykehamist Lodge of Freemasons bought the hill and gave it to

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2226-556: The option of going over or through Twyford Down had not been considered, and the alignment of the proposed six- lane M3 motorway (three lines in each direction) was to run through the Itchen valley roughly west of the existing four-lane bypass. This would also require the realignment of the Itchen Navigation into the water meadows. However, there would be further screening of the motorway and pedestrian access to St. Catherine's Hill from

2279-468: The route of the M3 was then fixed as far as Bar End, to the north of St. Catherine's Hill, that its route from there to Compton would undergo a fresh study, specifically stating that the Winchester Bypass should continue to be operational during construction of any new road, and that environmental matters were a key concern. By February 1983, consulting engineers Mott, Hay and Anderson had submitted

2332-465: The route of the old A33 Winchester bypass in mitigation of the land lost to the motorway which was threatened by a Park and Ride site. The legal action failed and the campaigners claimed that they had been betrayed for a second time. Land was provided elsewhere in mitigation. In 2004, Winchester Cathedral received £86,000 from the Highways Agency in compensation for increased traffic noise from

2385-545: The scheme, pointing out that Winchester and the Down had been cut off since construction of the old bypass anyway, and growth of Southampton Docks meant that improved links from London and the Midlands would become increasingly essential. This scheme was eventually rejected due to intensifying local pollution and disturbance. In 1981, Kenneth Clarke , then the Parliamentary Secretary for Transport, stated that, since

2438-469: The south side of the hill. In the Early modern period , a mizmaze was cut on the hilltop. Winchester College football used to be played on the hill; in an old custom , members of the college assemble on the hill every year, early in the morning. Geologically, the hill is part of a local anticline in the chalk, which is of Turonian age in the Upper Cretaceous . The local ecology is dominated by

2491-470: The south, Oliver's Battery to the west, Magdalen Hill to the north, and Telegraph Hill and Chilcomb Down to the east. St. Catherine's Hill belongs to the roughly 90 million years old Upper Cretaceous 'New Pit Chalk Formation' within the Turonian stage. The hill is bounded to the south by Plague Pits Valley, a dry valley in the chalk of Twyford Down. To the west, the line of chalk hills has been transected by

2544-457: The top of the down, going directly from Alresford to Twyford , avoiding Winchester. This remained the main coaching route until about 1800, when an alternative route via Winchester (now mostly the A31 and former A33 ) was formed. During this time, and up to the 19th century, the area was sometimes known as Morestead Down after the nearby village of Morestead . Hockley Golf Club was established as

2597-417: Was a matter for the police. The protest attracted different classes of people, the many of whom were peaceful. According to Denham, a popular phrase amongst those protesting was "I never thought that I would find myself doing something like this." Stephen Ward, who had been involved in the original 1970s protest, decided in early 1993 that excessive force was being used against protesters, and started keeping

2650-619: Was no evidence to suggest she had done anything more than take photographs, the injunction was upheld. Protester Rebecca Lush of the Donga Tribe , who had stayed on the down from September to the night of eviction, later claimed "It was a horrific experience and very violent. We were dragged through thorns and we were being kicked and punched and someone pulled out a clump of my hair." In March 1993, Kenneth Carlisle , then Minister for Roads and Traffic, refused to order an inquiry into any wrongdoing or excessive force by security officers, stating it

2703-546: Was opened in 1985. The third and final phase was to extend the motorway from Winchester to Southampton and the M27 motorway , and the northern part of this section was to impact on Winchester's bypass. Winchester had been a traffic bottleneck for many years as several major routes passed through the historic city centre, including the A31, A33 and A34 , as well as smaller routes like the A272 . In

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2756-461: Was opened, making the M3 a continuous motorway. The old A33 Winchester Bypass between Bar End and Compton was then closed and removed. The new cutting caused the loss of 1.91 hectares (4.7 acres) of SSSI land. To redress this, the old route of the A33 was planted with 7.2 hectares (18 acres) of species-rich grassland under the supervision and monitoring of the Institute of Terrestrial Ecology . Replacing

2809-414: Was using the bypass. Morgan Morgan-Giles described the bypass as "utterly inadequate and dangerous, as everybody who lives in or near Winchester will agree. The accident figures are appalling. Therefore, a new motorway somewhere to relieve the traffic is urgently needed." The crossing at Bar End was grade separated in 1973, but the junction at Hockley remained a key point of congestion. At this point,

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