Transport Secretary Alistair Darling today rejected a raft of plans to cut traffic congestion in Sussex, including five separate projects to ease misery on the busy A27.

The measures were turned down on the grounds they would be bad for the environment.

In a Commons statement he also sent controversial £27 million improvements to dual the road between the Southerham roundabout, Lewes, and the Beddingham roundabout back to the drawing board.

Pressure groups Transport 2000 and Friends of the Earth had said the proposal would brutally scar the South Downs National Park and Mr Darling has called for the plans to be revised.

The Worthing tunnel, which would have taken the A27 underground around Worthing and Lancing and under parts of the South Downs, was rejected outright.

Mr Darling also ditched Chichester bypass improvements and bypasses for Arundel, Selmeston and Wilmington.

Road protesters had already begun digging themselves in to stop the Arundel bypass being built through woodland at Tortington Common and nearby Binsted Wood.

They had said the road would ruin one of only two large areas of surviving ancient woodland in the coastal plain of West Sussex.

Mr Darling said the five projects would have "unacceptable and avoidable consequences to the local environment" and that local planners should find less damaging alternatives.

Mr Darling also used the announcement to take the first step towards the introduction of controversial "road user charging" schemes.

He said: "It has to be considered as part of sensible management of our roads. It could provide a far better deal for motorists giving them choice as to how and when they travel."

The announcement did not deal with the thorny issue if the Hastings bypass, which is still being considered by ministers.

Mr Darling was announcing a raft of multi-billion nationwide road development projects today.

Other schemes include plans to widen the M25, which green groups say will also threaten the proposed South Downs National Park, and the introduction of road charging throughout England.

Drivers may have welcomed the proposals but environmental groups are horrified.

The Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) said widening much of the M25 to four lanes in each direction would merely mean "more Tarmac for more traffic".

But Geoff Dossetter of the Freight Transport Association said: "We believe that the UK deserves a roads infrastructure appropriate to the operation of the fourth largest economy in the world."