Our Chilterns In Crisis Appeal

The Chiltern Society has been overwhelmed by the response to its Chilterns in Crisis appeal and would like to thank everyone who has already donated to support their work. They provided the following update.

With such pressure on our countryside we need to work together to tackle the spiralling number of new developments, monitor the changes to well-trodden footpaths and protect our disappearing green spaces.

The countryside’s character, the part nature can play in helping to address our climate crisis and its benefit to our wellbeing, is under greater and more urgent danger. It is a pressing and ever more visible crisis:

• Pressure on the UK’s Green Belt from new development has more than quadrupled in the past eight years(1)
• Our rare chalk stream habitats have been 60% drier in recent summers(2) due to the devastation of climate change and our growing population’s insatiable water consumption
• HS2 continues to pose a serious threat, with the fate of the Misbourne aquifer, large areas of ancient woodland and rare wildlife, like barbastelle bats, still hanging in the balance
• Our nationally important chalk grasslands now cover just 1%(3) of the AONB, and mostly in small, isolated fragments

In the uncertain times ahead, to ensure our ‘new normal’ is a greener one, we need your help. The choice we face is a simple one. If we want our children and grandchildren to grow up in the Chilterns we love, we must act decisively and we must act now.

If would like to consider making a donation, any amount will make a difference to our work.

We have the expertise, passion and vision to restore and enhance our countryside and to improve residents’ and visitors’ health and happiness but without your dedication it would not be possible.

Click here to donate. Thank you.

REFERENCES: 1. State of the Green Belt, CPRE 2021, 2. CCSP Annual Review 2018-19, CCB 2019, 3. Chilterns Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty Management Plan 2019 –2024, CCB 2019