'Give peas a chance' M25 bridge graffiti removed

The original 'Give peas a chance' graffiti has been replaced with 'Helch a chance'

Some M25 users have been left "devastated" to find a treasured piece of road graffiti has been removed.

A bridge between junctions 16 and 17 in Buckinghamshire daubed with "Give peas a chance" graffiti signified to many the fact they were nearly home.

But "Helch" has now replaced part of the graffiti and one woman said she was "overwhelmed to hear my favourite piece of public defamation has been defamed".

Network Rail, which owns the bridge, said it did not remove the graffiti.

It is not known who or what "Helch" is.

The graffiti was not thought to refer to the popular green legume

"Peas" was reportedly the name of a London graffiti artist who daubed his name on the M25's only Edwardian bridge, near Denham.

The words "give" and "a chance" were added later, with the amended graffiti thought to refer to his frequent arrests, according to an historic building report by Oxford Archaeology.

A Facebook group to celebrate the graffiti has nearly 8,000 followers and the person behind the group, who does not wish to be named, said the reaction has been "heartfelt and devastated".

He said: "It's a sign of being nearly home. It's a sign of family.

"People have been tagging sisters and brothers on the group and saying and 'can you believe this has happened?' and the response is 'oh my goodness this is devastating'."

The original graffiti is believed to have been painted over on Sunday and has since been added to with the word 'Helch'

Katie Stileman, who lives in Oxford but grew up in south London, said the bridge "was a regular feature of Christmas, Easter and summer visits to grandparents, a homecoming banner, a glimmer of hope in the darkest of car journeys".

"Also the first person to spot and call it would win a Penguin biscuit from the front," she added.

The admin of the Facebook group added: "The message from the group is let's get this clean, wipe off all the graffiti and get 'Give Peas A Chance back' from the photos - get a professional artist to put it back, pixel by pixel."

A Network Rail spokesman said: "While the graffiti is well-known to motorists, we can't condone people putting lives at risk to vandalise this bridge.

"If graffiti is offensive, we will look to remove it as quickly as possible. We would discourage anyone from trespassing on the railway for any reason."