Former Greens leader and environmentalist Bob Brown says the residents who have blocked the bulldozers tearing down the Gelorup woodlands south of Perth are the new-age Noahs the world so badly needs in this extinction crisis.

“While the ministers for the environment in Perth and Canberra back the needless flattening of these woodlands, which contain five species threatened with extinction, these good, ordinary Australians have had the guts to make a stand for the planet’s future. They, not weak-spined environment ministers, are the heroes of the environment in this age of extinction. Millions of Australians will applaud their stand,” Bob Brown said.

A poll last week showed that a big majority of Perth motorists want the woodlands saved and an alternative route taken for the Bunbury bypass