CIVIC leaders in Lydney are backing a campaign to declare the Forest of Dean as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

Lydney Town Council has signed up to Campaign to Protect Rural England’s bid for the Dean to be given AONB status.

The nationally renowned Forest has never been formally recognised through designation as a protected landscape.

The Gloucestershire branch of the CPRE is currently lobbying for Natural England to grant AONB status for an area roughly the size of the Forest District.

Councillor Alan Preest, who supports the proposal, will ask the Forest of Dean District Council to support the campaign at their full council meeting on December 3.

He said: “What I like about the document produced by CPRE Gloucestershire is that it specifies that it won’t impact on the brownfield sites in the four towns so it won’t have an impact on industrial jobs.

“I think this is something that certainly district council and possibly Shire Hall should support.”

Cllr Don Pugh said: “The AONB status does add protection to rural areas.

“It recognises that towns need to grow, but that the natural world should be protected.”

Colin Evers, one of the authors of the Forest of Dean AONB proposal, said it would be great to get the support of the district council. He added: “Anything that helps raise the issue can only be beneficial.

“Granting AONB status won’t stop business, nor will it stop houses being built nor stop education.

“It will simply give the Forest of Dean the distinction that it deserves.”

The Dean was recommended for national protection in the reports to Government after the Second World War which led to the system of National Parks and AONBs being introduced. Some 232 square miles of the Forest of Dean and Wye Valley were identified as meriting protection.

The Wye Valley was designated an AONB in 1971, but the Forest of Dean was left out as the view was that the area formed a distinct landscape separate from the Wye Valley and that designation was not necessary as the Forestry Commission had adequate powers for meeting amenity and recreation needs under 1968 Countryside Act - but this completely disregarded the landscape merits of the non-afforested parts and the need to consider the area as a whole.

A spokesman for Natural England, the government’s adviser for the natural environment, said: “Our existing programme of AONB boundary variations will fully occupy the resource we have available for landscape designation work until 2018/19 at the earliest.

“Once existing work is at or nearing completion, we will be in a better position to undertake any initial assessments of potential new cases, which includes the Forest of Dean.”