The wild horses of Newbury

[mamos]

Not many things reduce me to tears but watching this short film certainly did

http://channelwebscene.co.uk/index.php?page=newbury

mamos

[Green Aura]

That was amazing! Sorry, I'm a bit lost for words.

[old tree man]

very sad

[123sologne]

What a very sad story.

[snapdragon]

I'm not clicking it if it's a sad story

[mamos]

It is more moving than sad.
Here is the description of the film by the film maker

The Wild Horses of Newbury

Mark Carroll



During the infamous anti road building protests at Newbury, England in 1996-1997,
Mark Carroll made a short film called 'The Wild Horses of Newbury'

'The Wild Horses of Newbury' was shot very early on a single morning in February.
The whole episode only lasted a few minutes.. nothing was staged.
 The bypass security guards and police had circled two very old Oak trees and were preparing to chop them down,
 when two scruffy, seemingly wild horses appeared and began to interfere with the felling.
 One of the horses even confronted one of the police horses..... It was a very magical moment.

"I was at the Newbury bypass protests, 10 years ago, filming the evictions on a Hi8 Camcorder. 
Very early one February morning, I found myself in a field with over 500 security guards and police. 
They had surrounded a small copse and a couple of huge, old oak trees, and were preparing to chop them down. 
They had successfully outwitted and outnumbered the protesters.


In the chaos accompanying the operation, some hedges and fences had been destroyed and these two horses were roaming virtually free.
 As the chainsaws started, they didnt run away as you'd expect, but towards the felling.
 I just grabbed the camcorder and started filming.
 Nothing was staged, the whole episode only lasted a few minutes, but had quite a profound effect on everyone there. 
Even the police were dumbfounded, especially by the 'confrontation' between the 'wild' horse and the police horse."

Mark Carroll 2007

[President Bartlet]

I went to the protest once (obviously before I assumed the Presidency )

It wasn't on the day of the horses, but what happened looked amazing.

The bypass is an horrendous desecration of a beautiful, ancient landscape. Peak time congestion returned to its pre bypass levels less than ten years after the completion of the road, so there hasn't even been any benefit to car drivers.

Seeing so many ancient trees being felled and looking at the devastated landscape afterwards was extremely sad. I don't think I've met a braver bunch of protesters either. When we were there we were providing ground support for the tree and underground dwellers and people were giving everything to try and save that area.

[bonniethomas06]

Oooh, creepy and very sad - made my spine shiver! I don't get it with road building - it seems obvious that if you build more roads, there will be more cars?

It is the same with house building, which the UK governments, both of them, seem obsessed with. It seems like a chicken and egg thing - surely, the more houses you build, the more the population will increase - so building enough houses to meet the current shortage will only be a temporary fix? Certainly not one worth sacrificing the green belt for?

Thanks for posting this vid, very thought provoking.

[bonniethomas06]

...and two days later, I have done a lot of reading on tinternet about the Newbury bypass and the protests - I was only 14 at the time and it kind of passed me by.

I am amazed! By the stupidity of the goverment, the underhanded way that the go ahead was given early and without consideration of any other options, and the way that it all contravened EU law!

I am also very impressed by the tenacity protestors and their legacy on the road building programmes of today. Does anyone know what happened to Swampy in the end?

[TheGoodEarth]

Last I heard Swampy was living in a kind of eco village/commune type place in west Wales I think. I really admire the fact that he has managed to maintain his alternative lifestyle and principles and that it wasn't just a studenty cool thing to do.

[bonniethomas06]

Me too, it was a brave thing for an 18 year old otherwise quite conventional middle class oxford boy to do.

I would be really interested to hear anyone elses experiences of the protests (If Mamos doesn't mind me asking on this thread) - I am thinking that it may be an ishy use of my legal career to get into planning and environmental law. I had a heated debate with a collegue yesterday about whether the protests were worth it or not. My colleague thinks that the protesters lost the battle, because the road was built anyway, and it just cost us all £24 million extra.

But I argued that the fact that the cost was increased means that since then, planners have increased budgets to deal with the cost of protests, which makes some roadbuilding schemes unviable on the grounds of cost....so it has worked in the long run?