Please oppose the wholesale cutting down of the trees in the green corridor at the entrance into Lewes!

The company Human Nature have submitted their planning application to develop the Phoenix industrial estate in Lewes.

The developer is planning to cut down most of the trees on the industrial estate and all the trees along the Phoenix Causeway (on the left hand side as you walk from the town towards the bridge). See their plan below.

These mature trees house a host of wildlife (birds, insects, small mammals including bats), provide oxygenation to a heavy traffic area and constitute a valuable amenity to the town of Lewes that is not replaceable by the puny landscaping the developer is proposing to put in its place.

As Andy Egan, the Head of Conservation Policy at the Woodland Trust puts it: “The older a tree is, the more wildlife it supports, the more carbon it sequesters, and the better the canopy is. Mature trees are not replaceable with a sapling. There seems to be no appreciation that the starting point for regeneration or redevelopment should be designing around the nature that is already there.”

The trees along the Phoenix Causeway are covered by Tree Preservation Orders (TPOs). Tree Preservation Orders are most commonly used for urban and semi-urban settings, and for trees with high ‘amenity’ or ‘nature conservation value’. As Lewes District Council state in their website: “A TPO is applied to protect trees which bring significant amenity benefit to the local area.”

However, TPOs can be overridden by a planning application if the relevant authority agrees.

Note: the TPOs make allowance for a developer’s creating an entry into the site from the Causeway, so there is absolutely no need to fell all of the trees as Human Nature are intending to do - please see their Tree Removal Plan below.

The Lewes Arboretum i-Tree ecosurvey shows that as we stand we only have 11.5% tree canopy cover in Lewes, while the minimum recommendation for urban environments is 20%. Click here for a link to the survey

The developer's own report has identified the presence of multiple species of bats feeding and commuting among the trees of the Phoenix Causeway (as well as roosting in the building just behind Green Wall). Bats are a protected species by law and their habitat should not be destroyed. These trees are not replaceable. (Any remediation, however minimal, won't in any case take place until Phase 3, while demolition is in year 1; years apart).

Please join us in letting the South Downs planning authority know that we do not agree to the trees being felled. Sign this petition and let others know of it too.

You can also make representations about the application. It is important that as many of us as possible object to the tree felling as this will make the planners take notice.

You can tell the planners your views in the following ways: 

·      on-line at https://planningpublicaccess.southdowns.gov.uk/online-applications/

·      in writing to the South Downs National Park Authority, South Downs Centre, North Street, Midhurst, West Sussex GU29 9DH

·      by emailing planning@southdowns.gov.uk 

Remember to quote the case reference number SDNP/23/00526/OUT

The deadline for comments has now been extended to Sunday 1st October 2023.