Campaigners lose legal challenge to stop demolition of Perry Barr flyover
Campaigners have lost a legal challenge to stop the demolition of Birmingham's Perry Barr flyover.
Almost 10,000 people signed a petition against the City Council's planned works in the area.
The High Court says campaigners must now pay the City Council four thousand pounds in costs.
Members of the A34 Safety Action Group had applied to the High Court to seek permission to apply for a judicial review of the city council’s A34 Perry Barr highway improvement scheme.
The scheme is part of the council’s planned 500 million-pound works in Perry Barr in the run-up to the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.
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It includes the development of the Athletes Village and the redevelopment of Alexander Stadium, and the council has said the scheme is “absolutely critical” to the redevelopment of the area.
In March, Annette Pereira, Owen O'Neill and Dr Desmond Jadoo applied to the High Court for permission to seek judicial review of the council's decision to approve the scheme in December.
Objections were made on the grounds of a lack of a safety assessment, financial assessment, meaningful consultation or equalities impact assessment.
The High Court previously denied a separate request from the group for an injunction to stop works, which the City Council has previously said are due to start later this year.
Meanwhile, in the court’s latest decision, the judge rejected each of the group’s grounds for objection and said the campaigners’ objections on the grounds of a lack of meaningful consultation and equalities impact were “hopeless on the facts”.
The judge said it would not be “appropriate” to make a costs restriction order, and ordered the claimants to pay the city council £4,000 in costs.
Mr O’Neill has said the judge made no mention of the relevant case law the group provided back in April.
Mr O'Neill said they intended to put in place an online crowdfunding campaign to pay the costs.
Cllr Waseem Zaffar, Cabinet member for Transport and Environment at Birmingham City Council, said: “We are pleased with the decision of the court. It entirely justifies our position to robustly defend the claim which we have consistently said was without merit.
“Our focus now will be on delivering a highways improvement scheme that makes Perry Barr the best-connected district in Birmingham.”
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