Narrabri, Bellata, Gurley, Coonabarabran and Moree farmers, friends, visitors and plenty of others in between pulled up stumps along the Newell Highway and decked out the side of the road to ensure every passerby knew coal seam gas wasn’t welcome.

“Some are out because of local issues, they are worried about the water on their property, and some are here for global reasons,” People of the Plains member Kim Nevell said yesterday.

“We’re going to keep on trying [to get our message heard] and we’re doing it in all sorts of ways.

“For us in the Narrabri area, we’re the ones left with the Pilliga in our backyard.”

The roadside protest saw cars, trucks, horse floats and plenty of corflutes and signs litter the Newell Highway as part of the statewide protest, which included roadside demonstrations along the Pacific Highway, Buckets Way to Gloucester, and into Chinchilla in Queensland, totalling more than 2000km of roads.

For Mrs Nevell, a Narrabri resident, the concerns started when friends at Mullaley were impacted by plans for a pipeline in that area, and what started as a bit of research has snowballed into proactive campaigning.

The group believes the area could turn into an industrial wasteland if controversial CSG projects are given the nod to proceed.

“That’s how I got involved in the People of the Plains, the CSG awareness group,” she said.

“We’ve done surveys, we’ve been educating and just making others very aware of the concerns we have.

“It’s really a big network of people now. It is really connected across the whole of the North West.”