Love Epping Forest Manifesto: Protecting Nature and Wildlife

In the run up to the May elections, we are running Love Epping Forest Manifesto to put Epping Forest on the agenda. We are asking candidates to commit to delivering nine pledges over the next four years. The pledges have come out of our research and extensive engagement work with the Forest’s local communities.   

Below you can read about the evidence base for the pledges and concreate suggestions on how local councillors can action them. This article focuses on the three pledges that are centre around one of the three key themes: Protecting Nature and Wildlife.  

Old beech pollards in Epping Forest. Summer 2024. 

Pledge 1: Put the Forest’s wildlife, culture and heritage at the heart of planning policies and decisions

Local housing and infrastructure development pose a major risk to Epping Forest. But this also means that, by harnessing local government planning policy, local councillors can strive to protect the Forest.  

Major issues arise when any of these developments are built on land near Epping Forest. Increased populations in the local area brings major impacts. More cars on the road from local people means more atmospheric pollution, which harms sensitive Forest wildlife. More footfall from more local people – recent estimates put this at over 10 million people a year (1) – means more strain on Forest: a greater risk of tree roots being trampled and issues such as increased “eutrophication” of the soil in sensitive habitats (2).   

“Speculative” housing developments – those which haven’t been accounted for in a council’s strategy for development, or “Local Plan” – are particularly risky, as they have not been accounted for by the ecological and environmental assessments which the local authorities took to create their Local Plans. Moreover, far too often, local authorities determine them to be too small to warrant individual assessments of their potential ecological impact. However, these smaller developments, taken cumulatively, could have potentially massive impacts on Epping Forest, eroding the open space around the Forest. 

Councillors can tackle this in many ways. One is to lower the thresholds for certain assessments, including “Habitats Regulations Assessments” and “Environmental Impact Assessments,” which comprehensively assess whether/how developments can go ahead without causing environmental or ecological harm.  

Councillors can also oppose speculative developments, generally, and advocate for more strategic, centralised planning of infrastructure like solar farms. This would ensure that a full government and public consultation process takes place when determining where they should be built and what kind of compensatory measures would be appropriate, thereby mitigating harm to the Forest.  

The ‘Big View’ – looking to Waltham Abbey and across the Lea Valley. 

Pledge 2

[London:] enhance the Forest’s wildlife by creating new, and protecting existing, wildlife corridors to the Forest and deliver Suitable Alternative Natural Greenspaces which support biodiversity 

[Essex and EFDC:] Create and strengthen wildlife corridors to the Forest, while protecting Green Belt and resisting “grey belt” designations near the Forest 

Since a large part of Epping Forest is a Special Area of Conservation (SAC), local authorities already have a statutory obligation to ensure that development will not adversely affect the site (3). “Suitable Alternative Green Spaces” (SANGs) in their borough/district provide these mitigation measures. These are publicly accessible open spaces which people can visit instead of Epping Forest (therefore easing some pressure from footfall off the latter).  

We are asking councillors to ensure that wildlife can also be enhanced through the building of SANGs, by using them as opportunities for “wildlife corridors,” strips of land connecting fragmented wildlife habitats which allow animals and plants to move between them.  

There is currently limited connectivity between Epping Forest and other habitats and even between parts of Epping Forest itself. The Forest’s legacy as a surviving monument against the land enclosure of the 19th century means that it exists today as a fragmented landscape. Knighton Wood, Reed’s Forest and Woodford Green exist apart from the main body because the surrounding land was built on.  

We’re seeing positive schemes which are enhancing wildlife connectivity locally, with Redbridge’s Ilford Arrival scheme seeking to “strengthen connections between the Epping Forest and the River Thames along the River Roding way”. (4)  

In London especially, with the publication of the London Nature Recovery Strategy (5), which upholds wildlife corridors as one of its priorities, local councillors have a perfect opportunity to join up strategies to promote biodiversity locally with the implementation of SANGs near the Forest.  

EFDC also has the same obligation to implement SANGs, and a similar opportunity to create more wildlife corridors. Another prescient issue in Essex comes from national Government “grey belt” policy which, locally, puts the District’s Green Belt at risk.  

Grey belt is Green Belt Land that doesn’t “strongly contribute” to certain Green Belt purposes and therefore poses fewer legal restrictions for development (6). Grey belt land has fewer protections from development than Green Belt, so if this designation applied to Green Belt land around Epping Forest, it could put the Forest at risk (7).  

EFDC is currently working on their “Grey Belt Review.” When published, this will show which Green Belt land will become grey belt. This will also come along with a more general loosening of protections of Green Belt, outlined by new national Government planning policy which is still being drafted (8). We strongly urge councillors to, no matter the result of the Review, appreciate and uphold the integral role Epping Forest’s Green Belt plays in reducing pollution and urban effects (disturbance, noise and light pollution, etc.) in the Forest and the need to preserve it as open land.

 A104 Epping New Road runs through Epping Forest

Pledge 3: Reduce pollution in and around the Forest to protect the Forest and public health 

Pollution has profound effects on Epping Forest which we have previously highlighted the impacts air pollution in our air pollution brief. 

Moreover, the impacts of tyre wear from braking on pollutants is becoming more appreciated (9). This is something which is not accounted for in the pollution mitigation strategies of EFDC, Waltham Forest, Newham or Redbridge.  

Effect on Forest ecology qualifying features which make the Forest a Special Area of Conservation (SAC) (10). Increased nitrogen deposits within and increased acidification of the soil (both effects of pollution) threatens beech trees, lichen and moss within the Forest (11).  

The specific effect on Forest visitors is also profound. Forests should provide a refuge of clean air, but visitors going to Epping Forest are vulnerable to pollution from heavily used roads like Epping New Road and Rangers Road (12)  

As “competent authorities” who preside over the SAC, EFDC, Waltham Forest, Redbridge and Newham have an obligation to mitigate the impact of pollution on the Forest. 

We are relieved to see some positive developments, with EFDC reporting decreased pollution levels around the Forest’s SAC (13).   

But councillors can do more to get these numbers lower. They can reduce cars on the road by removing parking spaces from new developments as well as funding more public transport and active transport initiatives and ensure that their air pollution strategies remain updated and comprehensive.  

References:  

1. 2023, Epping Forest set to break records by exceeding 10 million visits in 2023
2. 2022, Nutrient fertilization by dogs in peri‐urban ecosystems – De Frenne – 2022 – Ecological Solutions and Evidence – Wiley Online Library
3. 2017, The Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017
4. 2024, Ilford Arrival | Let’s Talk Redbridge
5. 2025,Local Nature Recovery Strategy | London City Hall
6. 2024,National Planning Policy Framework – GOV.UK
7. 2026, Green Belt is not a Grey Area: Grey Belt Policy in Epping Forest District
8. 2025, National Planning Policy Framework: proposed reforms and other changes to the planning system – GOV.UK
9. 2020, Press Release: Pollution From Tyre Wear 1,000 Times Worse Than Exhaust Emissions — Emissions Analytics
10. Epping Forest – Special Areas of Conservation
11. 2019, Assessing air pollution impacts on ancient woodland – ammonia
12. 2017, Personal exposure to fine particulate air pollution while commuting: An examination of six transport modes on an urban arterial roadway | PLOS One
13. 2025, 2025 Air Quality Annual Status Report