MORE THAN 100,000 have now signed a petition opposing the Stonehenge A303 tunnel scheme.

The petition organisers, the Stonehenge Alliance, say the number of signatures has more than doubled since the petition was first presented to Downing Street in February.

The petition, which is separated into one for those in the UK and another for those outside of the UK, has a combined total of 120,490. People from more than 100 countries have now signed it.

The A303 Amesbury to Berwick Down scheme proposes to construct a new section of dual carriageway - in a tunnel - on the A303 between Countess roundabout and the dual carriageway section to the west of Winterbourne Stoke.

Mike Birkin, speaking for the Stonehenge Alliance, said: "The amazing recent finds show once again that there is so much more to the Stonehenge landscape than the eye alone can see. The UK government and its agencies have a duty to protect the World Heritage Site as a whole.

“This alone is reason for Grant Shapps to reject the road scheme, even before he factors in its enormous cost to save eight minutes journey time. The Stonehenge tunnel and road project ploughing across the prehistoric landscape are likely to amount to little more than a shameful huge white elephant."

Last month, the decision on whether or not to build a tunnel underneath Stonehenge was delayed for four months "following notification of a recent archaeological find".

This came after a team of archaeologists discovered a major new prehistoric monument just a short distance away from Stonehenge.

Historian and filmmaker Professor Michael Wood, in a video published by Stonehenge Alliance, said: "The plan was always wrong. But now, in summer 2020, every calculation on which the plan was made is now out of date. There's still time to reconsider, and we should".

In a statement on the government website last month, MP Andrew Stephenson said the deadline for the decision is to be extended to November, Friday 13 - an extension of four months - to "enable further consultation on and consideration of this matter before determination of the application by the Secretary of State [for Transport, Grant Schapps]".

Speaking after the announcement of the decision deferral last month, Derek Parody, Highways England Project Director for the A303 Stonehenge scheme, said: “We have received the announcement to defer the DCO decision on the A303 Amesbury to Berwick upgrade and we will be working with the Department for Transport in the coming months to assess the timescales for the project.

“We are confident that the proposed scheme presents the best solution for tackling the longstanding bottleneck on this section of the A303 returning the Stonehenge landscape to something like its original setting and helping to boost the south-west economy.”

The Stonehenge Alliance petition can be found here.