The preferred route for the East West Rail development linking Cambridge to Bedford will 'devastate' nationally important farmland habitat, campaigners have warned.
The route announced last month will slice through Countryside Regeneration Trust’s (CRT) Lark Rise Farm in Comberton, Cambridgeshire.
The environmental charity said it would "destroy" the habitat of ground-nesting skylark, grey partridge, and lapwing.
It would 'reverse years of hard work' by the CRT and its tenant farmer Tim Scott to create an "exemplar of nature-friendly farming on the site".
Mr Scott said: “It’s all very well off-setting habitat by planting a few trees elsewhere, as East West Rail propose to do, but for species that live in open farmland that simply isn’t going to work.”
Farmland birds are some of the most threatened species in the country, a key driver for the formation of the CRT 30 years ago.
The most recent government statistics show that species including yellowhammer, linnet, corn bunting and grey partridge have been on a downward slope since the 1970s.
However, the CRT’s monitoring has shown that Westfield is performing better than the national trend.
The farm has recorded 20 percent of all British bird species and almost 50 percent of butterflies being recorded in the area, according to the charity.
But CRT conservation officer, Dr Vince Lea said he was 'deeply concerned' about the environmental impact of the railway’s course.
“No amount of ecological compensation sites will make a difference to these kinds of species. They need farmland habitat, like we currently have at Westfield.
"This route makes two of our four fields smaller, reducing their suitability for species that like the open expanse of farmland, and land the far side of the tracks will be cut off from the farm, making it unproductive.
“Large flocks of Red-listed birds use these fields in winter with many hundreds at times; some of these will certainly be impacted, literally, by the passing trains as well as disturbed during the construction works."
Dr Lea warned: "Species like golden plover are very traditional in their site selection and once they are gone, they are gone for ever.”
