BOYCOTT FORDS!’ CALL AT ANGRY SIDFORD MEETING

There was standing room only at Sidford Social Hall last night at a meeting called by local residents to “Say No to Sidford Business Park”.

Feelings ran high as speaker after speaker condemned this “monstrosity of a project” on road safety, environmental, and flooding grounds.

Notable comments included:

a plea from a Director of the Norman Lockyer Observatory “not to kill” astronomy in Sidmouth with the bright lights of a Business Park.

a warning from a governor of Sidbury primary school that increases in heavy vehicles would place schoolchildren in greater danger on the village’s narrow roads which often lacked pavements.

claims from an environmentalist that rare, protected horseshoe bats were likely to be present in larger numbers than estimated in the planning application.

Among many suggestions to mobilise opposition was a mass boycott of Fords of Sidmouth, the applicant.

This was enthusiastically supported, and will be actively considered by the organising committee.