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A pensioner had his beloved garden bulldozed after telling the government he didn’t want them to knock down his home to make way for a £2bn ‘road from hell’.
Mr Watkeys, 75, was initially informed officials would not need any of his land or house of 65 years to build the new Heads of the Valleys highway which opened on Friday in Merthyr Tydfil, Wales.
But a change of mind from the Welsh government meant the longstanding local would go on to lose a third of his precious garden to the scheme where he once grew fruit and veg and sat under a beloved oak tree to watch bats.
The 75-year-old, a former microbiologist, was offered compulsory purchase of the property but he refused due to his attachment to the dwelling.
As a result, the 28-mile road now snakes round his house not through it and he’s left with a massive wall at the end of his garden – which he has started to replant.
The Heads of the Valleys road officially opened on Friday after 23 years of roadworks and a £2bn spend.
Another affected man described it as ‘like the road from hell’ at the start of this year but added ‘not even Chris Rea would dare come here’.
Proponents say the road – one of the UK’s expensive and most complex – has made many journeys shorter and hope it will bring prosperity to among Britain’s most deprived areas.
Mr Watkeys is pictured here in what remains of his garden which now after it was bulldozed under the directorship of the Welsh Government
The 28-mile road now snakes round Mr Watkey’s house not through it and he’s left with a massive wall at the end of his garden – which he has started to replant
An aerial view shows the road and the positioning of Mr Watkeys house and garden in relation to the traffic
Mr Watkeys reminisced he used to love sitting in his garden at night which was then located next to the relatively small A465.
He said: ‘The whole process has been upsetting. It’s been stressful. I’m left picking up the pieces.
‘It has been extremely stressful for a lot of years.
‘They said we want to knock down your garage and we need your drive. You can imagine my response. So they found another way.
‘I like all types of gardening. I grow some of my own veg – kidney beans, broad beans, French beans, peppers, chiles, tomatoes.
‘When I was a kid, you’d look out onto the garden, and there’d be goldfinches, bullfinches, tits, wrens, a couple of jays, and woodpeckers.
‘You’d hear owls in the evenings. You’d always have a few hedgehogs.
‘But now, you’re lucky if you see a few blackbirds.
‘There aren’t any birds left, nothing. It’s almost devoid of the wildlife that you used to see. It’s because the habit is gone.
Mr Watkeys reminisced he used to love sitting in his garden at night which was then located next to the relatively small A465
He said: ‘The whole process has been upsetting. It’s been stressful. I’m left picking up the pieces’
‘I like all types of gardening. I grow some of my own veg – kidney beans, broad beans, French beans, peppers, chiles, tomatoes,’ he added
Mr Watkeys has lamented the loss of his oaks, his hawthorns and his lovely 70-year-old oak tree that he used to sit under at the bottom of his garden to watch bats
‘I’ve lost oaks, I’ve lost hawthorns. They took down a lovely 70-year-old oak tree at the bottom of my garden.
‘In the evenings, bats used to come around the oak tree, for the gnats and insects. Now, you don’t see any. I miss it. It was a sign of life, really.
‘It’s the rebuilding of it. I’ve turned it over once. I want to put in some lilacs and other plants which I’ve saved.
‘I did a couple of hours out there yesterday digging it over, and it will need some more before I start planting.
‘I wanted to plant some stuff in it this year, but somehow I can’t see it. It’s going to take me another 12 months to dig it over and get some humus in it.
‘Unfortunately, at my age, I wont see the full effect of it’, he said, adding: ‘And all that is because of the road.’
Mr Watkeys explained there were initially assurances the new road would not take any of his land – but the powers that be then said they wanted to knock down part of his house.
It was then that the Welsh government offered to buy the house, in the Cefn Coed area of Merthyr, but Mr Watkeys said he declined.
The Heads of the Valleys road officially opened today after 23 years of roadworks and a £2bn spend
Mr Watkeys explained there were initially assurances the new road would not take any of his land – but the powers that be then said they wanted to knock down part of his house
It was then that the Welsh government offered to buy the house, in the Cefn Coed area of Merthyr, but Mr Watkeys said he declined
In February 2019 advisors from the firm involved in the road expansion requested a meeting and came to see Mr Watkeys at his home
The keen gardener told of how he grew up in the home and both his parents and wife died there – and that he could not part with it.
Mr Watkeys recalled how in February 2019 advisors from the firm involved in the road expansion requested a meeting and came to see him at his home.
He said: ‘Two of them came and sat down. I made them a cup of tea and a cup of coffee. I can remember it now like it was yesterday.
‘They said “our plans have changed. We’re going to knock your garage down.
‘”We want the whole of your drive for our working area and you can have that bit back when we’re finished”.
‘The heating, my hot water and everything was at the back of the garage, so I think you can imagine my response to that. You fight it as best you can.’
After challenging that initial offer, Mr Watkeys said the firm came back and said ‘we’ve found another way of doing it. We just need this bit of the garden’.
Mr Watkeys said: ‘You get compensation but it still hasn’t been settled yet. It’s a compulsory purchase so they can do what they want.
After challenging an initial offer, Mr Watkeys said the firm came back and said ‘we’ve found another way of doing it. We just need this bit of the garden’
Transport secretary Ken Skates said he thanked residents ‘for their patience during the construction period’ and the Welsh government continued to ‘work with them to resolve any issues’
Almost 70 structures – including more than 40 new bridges and a dozen new junctions – have been built amid the upgrade
‘They were piledriving right outside my back door. That was hellish noisy. Extremely noisy.’
Mr Watkeys has been given interim compensation from the Welsh government for the loss of his garden but is awaiting a full settlement.
Transport secretary Ken Skates said he thanked residents ‘for their patience during the construction period’ and the Welsh government continued to ‘work with them to resolve any issues’.
The A465 crosses the south Wales coalfields, a national park and twists close to people’s homes in some parts.
Almost 70 structures – including more than 40 new bridges and a dozen new junctions – have been built amid the upgrade.
Workers planted 285,000 trees to mitigate the ‘significant environmental impact’.
