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About this episode

"You can't move a grassland without changing its environment - and if you change that, the community of plants and animals it supports is bound to change too. The first prerequisite for protecting an SSSI* is to leave it where it is. Quite simply, if you move it, you lose it." - Dr Richard Jefferson, English Nature ecologist The sign on the entrance to Ashton Court Park reads. "You are visiting a beautiful and peaceful park. Help keep it that way so that everyone can enjoy it." So what do North Somerset Council do? They give planning permission for the extension of Pioneer Aggregates Durnford Quarry into 20 acres of the park! But how come a park given in 1959 to the people of Bristol, under the condition that "no part of it should be set aside for works which would detract from its value as a recreation ground or prejudice the enjoyment of the people" can be excavated for minerals? You tell us! Despite ongoing protests, Pioneer began removing topsoil from the park's wildflower meadow last week, which is a site of Nature Conservation Interest, and home to three rare species of wild orchids as well as nesting skylarks, foraging bats, and badgers. The company plan to spend #1 million to remove 51 per cent of the twenty acre site in two metre square chunks, to be relaid half a mile away in a field on the other side of the quarry. This process is known as translocation - and it has been an unmitigated disaster when tried elsewhere round the country. "The idea that nature is so resilient that you just shift it around somewhere else and carry on has to be rejected." - Dr.James Bullock. Institute of Terrestrial Ecology

• Release Date

  Jul 27, 2009

• Runtime

  17:46