A CALL to save the market towns of Alton and Petersfield and the countryside around them is being made by the East Hants group of the Campaign to Protect Rural England.

The call is part of a national CPRE campaign under the banner of ÒLie of the LandÓ which has been launched because of concern that the countryside is under threat.

Head of rural policy at CPRE, Tom Oliver, has claimed that countryside character nationwide was being Òeroded remorselesslyÓ.

He said the Òrichness of diversity of our landscapes that has given us almost as many words for fields, woods or lanes as there are English counties, is being homogenised before our eyesÓ.

And he issued a call to arms to save the things that make English countryside so varied, distinctive and attractive.

Part of the campaign includes a pilot survey which, said Mr Oliver, had exposed how small market towns were losing their distinctiveness.

ÒCPRE is planning a major survey of dozens of such towns across England in order to learn more about how and why diversity and character can be retained while accommodating necessary change.

ÒWhether itÕs death by a thousand cuts or through individual knock-out blows, again and again the character of the English countryside is under attack as never before,Ó said Mr Oliver.

And he warned that all it would take for ÔblandnessÕ to triumph was to let events take their course.

ÒMiserably designed housing, futile attempts to build our way out of traffic congestion and inadequate attempts to give farming a purpose which commends broad public support, all contribute to the sense of anywhere and nowhere.

ÒEnglandÕs landscape has often been likened to a tapestry of ever-changing patterns of threads weaving and twisting to form a cloth of unrepeated colours and textures. If this is so then our cloth is being damaged. Details are fading, colours disappearing patterns are repeating in a duller fashion, year by year England is becoming less and less varied and more and more the same.Ó

He said in the absence of swift and effective government action, it was down to Òall of usÓ to decide whether countryside stayed or went.

ÒEveryone of us can influence the fate or this precious resource and CPRE is leading the way by showing exactly why this matters and how to play a part in deciding what happens,Ó said Mr Oliver.

Chairman of the East Hampshire district group of the CPRE, Christopher Napier, said: ÒWe have suffered from degradation of the landscape and the sense of place in the Alton and Petersfield areas from telecommunication masts, the removal of hedgerows, poor quality of design in the countryside and the urbanisation of rural roads.Ó

He said the aim of ÒLie of the LandÓ was to bring home the importance of sense of place not only spiritually and culturally but also economically.

One of the campaignÕs targets, he said, was to carry out assessments of areas in order to find out what made places distinct from each other.

In Hampshire some work had already been carried out through the Hampshire Landscape Strategy produced by Hampshire County Council.

ÒWe have something to work on here and the issue is about implementation,Ó said Mr Napier. ÒWe need to find out how we can make the strategy work to stop the Ôthousands cutsÕ which threaten the character of the countryside.Ó

Mr Napier said be believed planners at East Hampshire District Council were starting to give issues such as design much more weight and planning guidelines were beginning to give them more power to the elbow. ÒOver the last 20 years,Ó he told The Herald, Òthere are certain areas where there could have been tighter planning policy, EHDC have made mistakes, but I donÕt entirely blame them as planners are under huge pressure to provide housing and that is a regional and central government matter which people must raise their voices about.Ó

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ÒBut I think East Hampshire planners have their hearts in the right place, now they have to be seen to stand against some of the pressures from central government and the regions as well as developers themselves. The district council needs to be strong and when it is appropriate it needs to say ÔnoÕ if it has good reasons.Ó