AT the end of a devastating 744 page report on the future of the most important planning proposal in the history of Southampton Michael Hurley concedes it could easily have gone either way.

ABP lost it on a knife edge decision.

After quashing the plan he says: "I recognise that others might well reach a different conclusion on the same evidence."

That remarkable sentence follows an admission that without Dibden Bay the future of the port, the economy of the city and the country could be damaged.

He accepts:

Dibden Bay plans would create 2,000 much-needed jobs

The Dibden Terminal would stimulate the local economy and regenerate south Hampshire

Refusing it could mean Southampton losing its status as a premier port

Without more port developments the UK will have a shortfall in container handling capacity

But because it would be bad for the birds the plans got the boot.

Not only birds but salmon, saltmarsh on the shore and the water quality could all have taken a battering from the project, he found.

The plans from ABP made good use of existing road and rail links, he found, and wouldn't put too much pressure on the area's infrastructure.

Southampton was ideally located as a port and had the best facilities and the rare depth in its channel to take the new super tankers, which are over 300m long.

However, that Dibden would do "substantial environmental damage" to a site of special scientific interest and other important areas, outweighed the business benefits.

It wasn't only the impact on nature that was on his mind. There was the human rights of residents of Hythe and the New Forest, where locals would have to contend with a forest of high cranes as well as heavy traffic, light pollution and noise pollution. On top of that it would ruin the picture postcard image of parts of the New Forest and "urbanise" them.

But for all the argument and counter argument from hundreds of witnesses, experts, pressure groups and politicians it all came down to a simple difference of opinion.

Mr Hurley admits his decision relies on at least one of three other schemes elsewhere in the country being given the go-ahead or the UK faces watching business go overseas. If that happens his Dibden decision could well come back to haunt the country.