ONE of Hampshire's most committed environmental activists has died after a battle against cancer.

David Croker campaigned against extending the M3 through the Itchen water meadows at Winchester in the 1970s and then through nearby Twyford Down in the 1980s and early 1990s.

A Conservative city councillor, Mr Croker was a leading light in the Joint Action Group and Twyford Down Association.

Although the campaign for a tunnel under Twyford Down was ultimately unsuccessful, it helped persuade the government to curtail the road-building programme in the late 1990s.

In recent years Mr Croker, of Hyde Street, Hyde, campaigned on behalf of pedestrians.

Alan Weeks, chairman of Winchester Residents' Association, said: "He was a great Winchester man. People always respected his opinion."

Council leader George Beckett, who replaced Mr Croker as councillor for Compton and Shawford, said: "He always had Winchester's interest at heart."

He said that the campaign was a key reason why the government in 1990 unveiled a habitat restoration project, with the digging up of the A33 Winchester bypass around St Catherines Hill.

Mr Croker, who was in his 70s, died at home at the weekend. A memorial service will be held at a date to be confirmed.