Stonehenge update for RESCUE News September 2008

A 3-month consultation on the future of Stonehenge was launched in Amesbury on 15 July. The consultation, in two parts, seeks (i), views on a revised Stonehenge World Heritage Site (WHS) Management Plan and (ii), proposed sites for a new or improved visitor centre (VC).

Revision of the Stonehenge WHS Management Plan

The current Management Plan (published 2000), which has Supplementary Planning Guidance status, embraces national, regional and local planning guidance and policies. This Plan aims for recognition, protection and presentation of the cultural landscape of the WHS as a whole. Until the revised Plan is finalised and agreed by UNESCO in 2009, the current Plan remains the priority document for managing the Stonehenge landscape, and the one by which we should first judge any new road and VC proposals.

The c.160-page revised Plan seeks many of the same goals as the 2000 Plan but recognises that removal of the A303 over much of the WHS will not happen in the short term, primarily for reasons of cost. Significantly, it omits the current Plan's requirement for new visitor facilities to be sited outside the WHS "where they would have no impact on the archaeological landscape" but it recognises that care must be taken to protect landscape, archaeology and setting.

The revised Plan includes an agreed 'Statement of Significance' for both parts of the WHS (Stonehenge and Avebury), which lists the WHS's attributes of 'outstanding universal value' (OUV). These attributes include the siting, spatial interrelationships and physical remains of the Neolithic and Bronze Age ceremonial and funerary sites and monuments which, together with their associated sites of the period, form landscapes without parallel at Stonehenge and Avebury.

Unfortunately, the revised Plan contains numerous contradictory and confusing statements about OUV. The 2008 Draft Government Circular on Protection of WHSs, on which RESCUE has commented, contains similar inconsistencies. We hope that all of these inconsistencies will be ironed out to give clarity on what is to be protected and why.

Consultation on visitor-facilities

Five options, shown as encircled areas within which facilities might somewhere be placed, are set out in the consultation booklet. All assume closure of the A344/A303 junction and use of the A344 from Airman's Corner to the Stones as a visitor-access route only. Most options offer variations, including the separation of car parking from other facilities. Some offer park and ride and all include transport for those unable to walk any distance. A344 closure would require small-scale improvements at Airman's Corner and Longbarrow Roundabout.

The aim is to build new visitor-facilities in time for the Olympics in 2012; these to be some three times larger than the current facilities but smaller than the earlier proposed visitor-centre scheme at Countess East. The new car park would be twice as large as the present one (up to 800 cars and 40 coaches).

Of the sites proposed, two would require major new development well within the WHS: Durrington Down Farm (at Larkhill) and Fargo. These sites were rejected by the authorities for sound reasons long ago and would not meet Management Plan and planning policy demands that new development should not impact adversely on the WHS, its archaeology and setting. Redevelopment of the current facilities and parking within the existing footprint is a third option, although it is not clear how the larger facilities aimed for would be accommodated. The locations proposed at Airman's Corner and Rollestone Camp offer sites on the edge of the WHS, the former visibly impacting on the open landscape, notably in views from the west end of the Cursus. These two more distant sites would require park and ride.

It is understood that English Heritage favours Fargo, on the ridge west of Stonehenge, with improvements to the existing facilities 'a close second' (Wilts Gazette & Herald, 24.7.08). From the point of view of visitor-management and finance, Fargo would appear to be EH's best option. Was this the intended choice all along?

Members of the Stonehenge Advisory Forum, who took part in the Management Plan revision process, were astonished on a recent site tour to hear from the Forum's MoD representative that neither Rollestone Camp nor Durrington Farm were acceptable to the MoD as potential visitor-centre VC locations. Their close proximity to an ammunition dump, a helicopter flight path and noise from artillery firing, together with the issue of security, would apparently preclude their serious consideration; moreover, the cost of removing key MoD facilities to new locations would be enormous. It was also indicated that the MoD had informed HMG that it would not have accepted, across MoD land north of the Cursus, the proposed land-train visitor-transit route linked to the Countess East VC proposal, now abandoned along with the controversial A303 improvement scheme.

These revelations give rise to some serious questions.

If true, why did EH, a government quango, pursue its Countess VC proposals in the face of MoD opposition, albeit apparently privately expressed? If the MoD were not prepared to tolerate a significant element of that scheme across its land, why were the proposals not modified or abandoned, thereby saving much time, enormous expense and the considerable anxieties of local people affected by them?

Furthermore, if the MoD would not welcome a VC sited close to its Larkhill base, why have Rollestone Camp and Durrington Farm been put forward in EH's options consultation?

Setting these questions aside, and assuming, for the moment, that there are no barriers to any of the sites put forward (as we ought to be able to expect), some of the proposals now before us offer good solutions, especially if a light impact on the WHS is aimed for.

Durrington Down, Fargo, Airman's Corner and the current site beside Stonehenge are not locations for large new developments in the open countryside of the WHS and Special Landscape Area. It might, perhaps, be feasible to site a short-term, temporary car park at Airman's Corner, on the outside edge of the WHS, and make do with sprucing up the present facilities while a less sensitive site is sought ' although even temporary adverse impact on the setting of the WHS may be unacceptable.

Rollestone Camp, however, appears to offer all that the Management Plan demands: room for a larger visitor-centre on a brownfield site outside the WHS with easy access, via park and ride, to various locations from which to walk to the henge and/or explore other parts of the Site. There would be the possibility of siting small, inconspicuous shelters, also useful for educational purposes, at drop-off points at Fargo, Durrington Down Farm and elsewhere. Securing Rollestone Camp immediately, for car parking alone, would be worthwhile, since it would leave options open for a visitor-centre here in the longer term.

Should a Rollestone Camp visitor-centre not be acceptable to the MoD, even in the long term, then Greenland Farm buildings (not an option offered), on the western edge of the WHS, might be a possible alternative brownfield site with similar advantages and well hidden from view.

Time-scale

Linking of improvements at Stonehenge to the Olympics in 2012 should be intended as a catalyst rather than a condition for progress. Further information is needed on the availability and feasibility of suitable sites and variants, and we hope that Rescue, along with others, will be included in discussions. This encouraging initiative ought not to be marred by rushed decision-making.

Rescue, together with a number of other conservation and archaeological NGOs, including the National Trust, have been arguing for closure of the A344 and some improvement to (but not enlargement of) the present facilities as a first step towards finding a more sympathetic solution to rehabilitating the surroundings of Stonehenge. These actions ought still to be undertaken, should it not prove possible to do more at present.

Kate Fielden, September 2008.