[Diggers350] Woodlands.co.uk

david bangs dave.bangs at virgin.net
Fri Feb 11 17:59:41 GMT 2011


These ideas for 'left wing' woodlotting sound appalling, and reinforce my own adamant opposition to Forestry Commission privatisation. 

I know a number of recently woodlotted ancient woodlands in Sussex and they have in common a loss of coordinated management: coppice thrown out of cycle and left unmanaged, gates, structures, numerous fire sites, small built structures and hard standings, warnings against trespass, lights, clearances, dumped vehicles and other junk. I find them intimidating and deeply depressing.

What they are losing is nightingales (which won't come to uncoppiced woods), fritillary butterflies, tranquillity, and the possibility of a direct and relatively unmediated relationship with nature. 

Tread lightly. Take only your dreams...except your dreams for whacky shacks and fire sites and fences and hard standings and rustic gates and 'keep out' notices,

Dave Bangs 


  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Ben Mathers 
  To: john at permaculture-jb.me.uk 
  Cc: Diggers350 at yahoogroups.com 
  Sent: Thursday, February 10, 2011 1:12 PM
  Subject: Re: [Diggers350] Woodlands.co.uk


    
  I did get in contact with the folks managing their South Wales properties asking about their attitude to One Planet Development and whether there was anything in their covenant stopping people from living on the land and the woman I contacted definitely said that there wasn't. The only issue she thought would be with the planning department...

  Wouldn't it be great though if someone could buy these bits of woodland and then split them up and sell them for the £1,800 that was paid, does anyone know of anyone thinking of doing something like this? Even if you were to sell them for £2,800 you'd still be making a whopping £54,000 profit for doing nothing! I mean if a trust was set up to do something similar that money could then go into buying some more land and doing likewise, obviously with a strict covenant on the land ensuring low impact principles with areas of common land etc etc. I know this is probably something most people on this email group think about, but really it wouldn't need a very big initial outlay (well not very big for some people at least!). What is stopping people I wonder?

  Ben



  On 9 February 2011 10:01, John Boshier <john at permaculture-jb.me.uk> wrote:

      
    They may be unpleasant, but they do seem to be open to discussing One 
    Planet Developments in Wales, See 
    http://www.woodlands.co.uk/blog/woodland-economics/one-planet-development-in-wales-a-policy-for-low-impact-sustainable-livin/ 
    . I think the wording has changed a bit, as when I looked on their site 
    recently I think they said they would not object to it, and I've heard 
    this from another source.

    If anyone knows more I would like to know. I'm going to be producing a 
    One Planet Development newsletter, and am organising meetings to help 
    people get started on low-impact development in Wales. You can sign up 
    to the newsletter at http://www.eco-hamlets.org.uk/newsletters.php , and 
    I'd welcome any contributions to the newsletter.

    John



    On 07/02/2011 00:14, offgriduk wrote:
    > I see the unpleasant woodlands.co.uk was one of the early beneficiaries of the forest sell-off (Sunday Times 6/2/11) - buying 54 acres of glorious wood near Market Rasen.
    >
    > They paid GBP1800 per acre and will sell for GBP9000, removing the wood from public access and at the same time preventing the new owners from doing more than asset-stripping through the restrictive covenants they add to the sale - such as no living on the site.
    >
    > I would like to have a go at preventing woodlands.co.uk from buying further forests in the current selloff - if anyone has the necessary info, please send to nick at off-grid.net and I can put it fully in the public domain




  
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