Question 1
I support building additional homes for everybody with in CB4 area which must include all infastructure such as schools, medical centres and facilities for ensuring everyone can keep healthy and fit including green outdoor spaces, swimming pools and gyms. The addition of homes with people having to transport themselves and their families to and from the area mean that we need to place strong emphasis on sustainable and healthy transport options with walking and cycling at the centre of this combined with combating air pollution from cars and the heavier diesel vehicles used by businesses - e.g. skip lorries or tarmac lorries. With the PM emphasising how we've become a nation of overweight people with associated risks of long term illness and more urgently, the strong link between severe consequences of Corvid 18 and obesity means that we must put the health of everyone living in this local area at the centre. Local govenment are currently failing at maintaining pavements making it impossible for my 85 year old neighbour to get out of the house by foot - and police aren't tackling pavement parking blocking the footways. The local roads - in particular Fen Road regularly have incidents of dangerous and antisocial driving with a white van driver aggressively speeding towards my 5 y old daughter just outside the entrance to the river opposite Cheney Way and subsequently shouting abuse out of the window at us. I'm sorry to say and until local government are able to maintain the area to a point where it's usable by residents, and police can put an effective and long term stop to dangerous driving and antisocial behaviour in the area it's hard for me to see how we can consider lofty visions such as a Cambridge Metro. The plan calls for a vast increase in journeys to be by foot, cycle and public transport but I fear we will never see the Cambridge Metro and the result will be dangerous, polluted and congested roads including Fen Road, Milton Road and Green End Road and rogue parking by drivers with no space for their vehicles. If we want to avoid this we need a vision for safe, sustainable transport to and from the area by foot, bicycle and train + bus. I support Cambridge Past, Present and Future’s recommendation to establish a special purpose vehicle such as a locally-controlled Development Corporation to ensure that the vision for the area can be properly realised.
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No answer given
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Although Cambridge is experiencing a housing crisis, I do not agree that this development will aid this. This is a large number of new homes with a large number of new jobs, and this is unsustainable. The chalk aquifer that supplies the region’s water is already greatly over-abstracted: adding thousands of new homes and businesses (even if they are designed to be water-efficient) can only make this problem more acute. In social and economic terms, Cambridge is already in a ‘bubble’, with high costs of living. Cambridge also has high levels of inequality. I am opposed to the plans to redevelop North East Cambridge as put forward in this consultation. I believe that this important area of the city needs much more careful planning to ensure any development there helps to provide solutions to the escalating, and rapidly changing, issues of inequality, poverty, climate change and water shortages. My major concerns about this are both that the vision stated is overdeveloped and will lack in quality of life for those who live there, and that it is an unsustainable number of homes from water requirements purposes.
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I feel it's overdeveloped. Cambridge is a rural historic city and putting a big development on the outskirt would not be in keeping.
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Although Cambridge is experiencing a housing crisis, I do not agree that this development will aid this. This is a large number of new homes with a large number of new jobs, and this is unsustainable. The chalk aquifer that supplies the region’s water is already greatly over-abstracted: adding thousands of new homes and businesses (even if they are designed to be water-efficient) can only make this problem more acute. In social and economic terms, Cambridge is already in a ‘bubble’, with high costs of living. Cambridge also has high levels of inequality. I am opposed to the plans to redevelop North East Cambridge as put forward in this consultation. I believe that this important area of the city needs much more careful planning to ensure any development there helps to provide solutions to the escalating, and rapidly changing, issues of inequality, poverty, climate change and water shortages. My major concerns about this are both that the vision stated is overdeveloped and will lack in quality of life for those who live there, and that it is an unsustainable number of homes from water requirements purposes.
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Agree to a certain extent but concerned about the following: 8000 new homes with 0.5 cars/home = 4000 + extra cars that will add furhter problems to the existing congested Miltom Road Cycle routes need to be further expanded towards the city especially Fen road is not fit for purpose, not wide enough due to roadside reisident parking, and not safe enough due to heavy duty lorries servicing the industry accross the railway line. It is currently dangerous for cyclists.
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The proposal is overdeveloped so lacking in quality of life post Covid-19 Furthermore the original (pre Covid-19) Vision appears to have been diluted with lack of provisions as below: Car barns have disappeared Fen Road and level crossing unresolved No solution for bus depot or aggregates terminal No solution for other existing businesses No new sports pitches or swimming pool No new allotments No major new venue included Independent shops concept lost Science Park adds nothing Green space by river is vague (and I believe the travellers site is protected in law) No recognition that Milton Country Park is already at capacity ALL ADDS UP TO MORE STRESS ON EXISTING FACILITIES OUTSIDE NECAAP Population density of the proposal: Density will be three or four times the average at Eddington or the Mill Road depot. More accommodation is required but this is too dense and there is a lack of facilities and amenities. Cambridge is a low density, low building height city. This will be very high density, and the proposed 8 and 13 storey building will be very visibly and a blot on the landscape as well. One of the attractions of the science park is the green space and the buildings are modest in height, that will change if the proposal goes ahead as currently planned, this will turn the area into ‘any-town’, diminishing Cambridge and the science park itself. How many of the senior property developers, their financial backers, senior architects etc involved would be willing to live in this proposed development with such a high population density? Answer - probably none! A much better concept is Goldsmith Street in Norwich: Widely viewed as the best current exemplar of progressive, environmentally sound social housing Built to Passivhaus standard Density is still high, 83 dwellings/ha, but much less than general density for N E Cambridge, e.g. Brookgate 225 – 300 /ha, Sewage works 330 – 385 /ha, But Milton Road garages 75/ha, Note: Mill Road depot has 87/ha. Covid-19 impacts on the Vision: In the current Covid-19 pandemic, more people are working from home instead of working in offices where they can. Will someone living in the new accommodation have space to work from home, possibly with family members living with them? How much space will there be to be able to work from home, or for children to be able to study from home etc. in the proposed accommodation? Also trying to concentrate in an online work meeting or in an online school lesson is not easy if sound is bleeding into rooms from the next door neighbours. Will there be sound insulation between residents in the proposed high rise buildings to prevent this? There is a lack of green spaces in the Vision, indeed the science park green spaces are being infilled, how will someone working from home manage to get to a green space for their peace of mind and sanity? (Articles in the Times newspaper indicate that people in London are looking to move away from the city to suburbia to have more space to work from home and to have more green space/countryside within easy access). In a post Covid-19 world indication are that more people will have more flexibility to work from home entirely, or partially, and not work in the office 5 days a week. Is the current Vision to include more office based job in the development still valid? Would it not make more sense to reconsider the Vision and the strategic implementation of this once it has become clearer what the post Covid-19 ‘new world’ will look like than to implement a Vision that Covid-19 impacted? Transport - Covid-19 and climate change impacts: Legislation to stop selling new petrol, diesel and hybrid vehicles is coming into force in the future. The concept of the ‘car barns’ has been removed from the Vision. If people living in this new development need to use an electrical powered car how will they charge the cars batteries along with other residents if they are living in a densely populated high-rise 8 or 13 storey building.? In London and other big UK cities there are good public transport systems - but not in Cambridge, and for some people a car is essential (to get to work away from public transport, or if they are disabled or to quickly attend as a carer etc. etc.). If there is another post Covid-19 virus pandemic, and people are not willing to use the limited public transport, or cannot cycle, what then if they cannot recharge their electrical power cars living in a high density populated area? Has a study been made about the flood risk assessment been made to the area currently occupied by the sewerage works and the potential for increased intense rainfall with climate change and also the forecast rise in sea level. The vision and principles described support cycling and walking in the new district and surrounding areas. But how likely are they to be realised? Will this new district be another area that brings congestion and problems to nearby communities rather than benefits? Do the profits of landowners and developers have more influence than the needs of the local community? Extra traffic from A14, Northstowe, Waterbeach, Science Park and NEC, other Cambridge Developments Trips increase by factor of 3. Plan just assumes extra trips not made by car Plan assumes no extra trips on Milton Road because - Car use “discouraged”, Cambridge Autonomous Metro Equals Milton Road gridlocked? Environmental standards - Water and Energy: Water use target 110 litres ppd. Eddington design target 80 litres ppd (grey water, rainfall capture). Eddington had Ecology Officer from start of project). No specific commitment to green energy, district heating or highest residential building standards (Passivhaus/Sustainable Homes 6). Only ‘proposing robust targets’ and ‘encouraging ... low carbon lifestyles’.
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The emphasis on large number of jobs and homes means that all other objectives will be obliterated and fall far short of the laudibly expressed. The numbers and urban density must be reduced to produce a density and setting equivalent to Eddington. An appalling piece of work.
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Cambridge has already been growing quite quickly enough. There is no justification for further high-density housing development facilitated by moving the sewage works onto green belt land.
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I agree with the principles outlined in the vision statement. However, I am concerned that developers and landowners may have the power to water down these principles. I would also like to see more detail about how it will integrate with existing neighbourhoods in north Cambridge, rather than simply being connected to the centre as a freestanding suburb.
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..but the reality is that the vision doesn't match what you are doing. Need to be far more bold and go for net zero emissions. It's possible to do this so given it's a new development, this should be the gold standard rather than a weak 'ambition' to be net zero.
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Good to be bold and have an integrated strategic overall plan. I hope that it fits into an equally bold, strategic overall plan for the wider Cambridge area.
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The vision is great. Make sure you don't let the developers water it down.
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Indeed we need a Sense of Place, but a place in history as well as geography. If, optimistically, civilisation is able to constrain global temperature rise to 2 degrees the long term expectation is that the Fens will be inundated by the North Sea and the coast line will relocate to Milton. (Sources: climatecentral.org, floodmap.net). The A14 which borders the proposed development site will have a new role as the sea defence for Cambridge. Flood barriers at Bait’s Bite will take over the role of Denver Sluice to hold back high tide. History is being written. Perhaps such long term scenarios should not inhibit the economic growth of Cambridge in 2020; unless we remember that it is economic development that has driven climate change. The climate emergency is not an externality to be dismissed as acceptable collateral damage. It represents, in our county, the loss of prime agricultural land which may, or may not, feed future generations. Even by the end of this century sea level might rise by 2 metres and a high tide, adding just a further 2 metres, would be enough to reach the Fens. The storm surge in 1953 was more than 5 metres. Cambridge history tells another story, that of Charles Darwin observing the diversity of species in the 19th Century and the City Council declaring a Biodiversity Emergency in 2019. Two events are separated by an instant in geological time and mark the tipping point where life on Earth hangs in the balance. It seems that proposals for NEC respond to this context by densification, a business as usual dream world enabling the factory farming of humanity. Vision or horror show? Past performance of course is no guarantee of future returns. The economics of growth can become the economics of the Doughnut (Doughnut Economics, Kate Raworth, 2017) where we satisfy the central needs of humanity but hold back from all forms of exploitation. Vision 2050 starts here if you read on. There's a new district in Cambridge, it's called Attenborough. The third wave of the Cambridge Phenomenon started here and it turned out to be the wisdom to live within the boundaries of Nature. Soil was recognised as the most valuable resource we have and North East Cambridge developed as the centre of excellence for Agricultural Complexity. Threatened with the loss of wide open peat lands to erosion and sea level rise the food industry turned to intensive methods with a mosaic of agro-forestry, glasshouses and aquaculture as well as fiercely protected habitat (the Great Fen is just north of the flood barrier from Attenborough). Once the potential of complex farming became apparent the national decision was taken to secure the long term capacity for food production by protecting Fenland from the sea instead of abandoning it. The rising costs of food imports as fossil fuels were phased out made it essential. So a renaissance in the horticultural sciences provided a new focus for intellectual endeavours in the city and a potent synergy between urban and rural development. Attenborough has served as a model for villages in temperate regions around the globe with teaching, employment and food production in domes resembling the Eden Project in Cornwall. A range of jobs from labourers to professors all share the same aims, to create healthy communities of people and plants, with social cohesion as the by-product. Cambridge subsequently lost its reputation as the most unequal, the most divided city in the UK. To unlock the potential of Attenborough it took funding from central government to deal with the outdated, sprawling sewage works that had occupied a substantial fraction of the site. It was reduced on site to 10% of its former size and made a showcase of Cleantech as well as making a clear statement that a responsible city in the 21st Century takes care of its own waste instead of dumping it in someone else’s backyard. So here is a vision, not a blueprint. A different way to look at the issue from the viewpoint of lasting prosperity instead of profits extracted by developers.
We welcome the vision and principles which focus on a place for everyone with everything they need nearby, beautiful buildings and green spaces, and good links with surrounding areas. The guidelines support the type of development needed to help more people to walk and cycle. More people walking and cycling would help the local councils create a safe and collaborative district with healthy people and a strong community which will lead the way to a zero-carbon future. However, the details given in the longer Area Action Plan and supporting documents do not give confidence that this vision will be implemented successfully. The density and nature of the site has been determined by government funding, transport plans rely heavily on the delivery of schemes by other authorities (such as CAM metro) which may not be delivered in time, and the aim of creating a mixed-use site across the whole area has been lost due to the balance of power lying with landowners over the local community. Relying on developers to deliver the plan is also too risky: existing construction and applications for the area are already posing a threat to the vision as a whole. Lessons must be learnt from other developments across Cambridge and we support Cambridge Past, Present and Future’s recommendation to establish a special purpose vehicle such as a locally-controlled Development Corporation to ensure that the vision for the area can be properly realised.
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The vision comes at the expense of existing communities affected by the relocation of the sewage works and the development will create significant carbon through the unnecessary relocation of the recently upgraded sewage works. The whole life cost of the development is not been correctly calculated nor shared with the wider community in the consultation. The majority of the space in the development is given over to commercial space rather than housing. The housing proposed is extremely high density will not create a cohesive community that is able to grow, be socially cohesive and develop in this area. I believe that people do not want to live this way in cramped and dense housing with limited personal green space. In order to address climate change this development should not include the relocation of the sewage works which will contribute to rather than address climate change. Has the true cost of decontaminating and remediating the sewage works site been fully considered?
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The vision sounds good until you look at the details. No amount of pretty words will change the fact that there will be too many houses build too high with not enough green spaces in between. Particularly integration with existing buildings outside the area isn’t mentioned at all.
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Agree with the vision, but it seems the plan is to have 10000 new people coming from outside to work in this area. That seems crazy, and the proposed density seems about 2x too high.
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The vision will deliver transformational benefits to many aspects of the local economy.
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Laudable aims, but the challenge is to deliver them and maintain them into the future. Ownership of the area in the future, particularly the residential housing, by residents is important. The development phase should be coordinated and overseen by a single body.
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The vision and principles are excellent. However, the Area Action Plan and supporting documents do not provide full support. Transport plans rely on other authorities. The landowners/developers have a greater say over plans than the local community. For instance, plans for the area go against the vision. I endorse the idea of setting up a locally-controlled Development Corporation to ensure that the vision for the area can be enforced.
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The vision is too dense. The number of dwellings/home in the area is too large for the amount of public space.
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Disappointing. As a local resident, I certainly understand the need for additional development in the City and especially new affordable homes but we I am very concerned about the plans to redevelop North East Cambridge as put forward in this consultation. Naturally a plan which seeks to create an ‘inclusive, walkable, low-carbon new city district with a lively mix of homes, workplaces, services and social spaces, fully integrated with surrounding neighbourhoods’ intended ‘foster community wellbeing’ and be ‘socially cohesive’ is an attractive idea, but on the face of it it’s impossible to see how this can work with the ratios of buildings to hectare in this area. Indeed, the overall density, heights, lack of green space and infrastructure is a subject of considerable worry. It is also disappointing that Cambridge, with its own specific history and urban grain and high concentration of inventive and knowledge-based economies, is not providing the models of the very best quality of distinctive and sustainable development and not rolling out an inner-city model (c.f. J.G.Ballard’s 1975 novel High Rise). In my view, this really ought to be an opportunity for an outstanding sustainable ‘garden suburb’ development for the 21st century (perhaps drawing inspiration from BedZED, and not modern-day Singapore. I am concerned about the diminution of what began as a strategic vision and what seems to be evolving, and indeed between that and what will be delivered once the quantity surveyors have their cut of the development pack (qv the main station development).
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While generally good principles, there will need to be legally binding conditions on developers to ensure they meet these principles and that high quality cycle routes and green space are not sacrificed at a later date by those seeking greater financial profits from the development.
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Huntingdonshire District Council confirm that the draft North East Cambridge Area Action Plan as presented for consultation does not constitute a strategic matter that needs to be addressed as part of Greater Cambridge’s Duty to Cooperate.
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The vision is deeply flawed by trying to squeeze far too many people and too many jobs into too small a space. Numbers of residential units and number of jobs have increased from the original plans, and the positive elements have been eroded. Therefore whilst these are fine aspirations, what is on offer fails miserably to achieve any of them. The residential part is utterly over-developed, and will therefore not be attractive in any sense. The quality of life will perforce be low. It is completely alien to the City of Cambridge, which is low density and low rise. It fails to meet the highest environmental standards set by Eddington. We already have a perfectly well worked example in Eddington of how to go about this in a Cambridge setting. Eddington is the model, whereas this has all the ingredients to become a slum, comparable with the worst in Europe not the best.