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Telegraph
04-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
How a controversial cycle lane is tearing apart one of the UK's prettiest villages
The only discernible flicker of drama on a sunny Thursday morning in the tranquil Cambridgeshire village of Grantchester is when a gust sweeps a charming steel bucket off the lid of a wheelie bin (a tasteful royal-blue wheelie, at that). The crash startles those outside The Blue Ball Inn overlooking the idyllic Grantchester Meadows, where the Bloomsbury set once lolled by the River Cam. But sleepy serenity is quickly restored. Or so it seems. This is, after all, the medieval village and conservation area that hosts filming for the eponymous ITV detective drama, Grantchester (formerly starring James Norton), in which sleuthing vicars might appear cosy as toast, but tension never prickles too far behind its picket fences. And so it appears in the real-life village, too – its quaint thatched cottages masking a long-running drama of their own. A drama that, last week, peaked (some might argue farcically so) in the theatre of London's Royal Courts of Justice, where villagers found themselves a long way from their daffodils, battling a threat they claim puts their beautiful home at risk: a cycleway. On March 25, a three-day judicial review opened at the High Court, hinged around Grantchester Parish Council's objection to the construction of a greenway – a route for cyclists, walkers and horse riders – through the heart of its village, linking nearby Haslingfield to Cambridge. The case was brought against Greater Cambridge Partnership (GCP) – the committee behind the Haslingfield Greenway, made up of representatives from Cambridgeshire County Council, South Cambridgeshire District Council and Cambridge City Council – not because the parishioners (who raised £55,000 for their days in court) object to greenways, but because they insist the section through Grantchester will destroy its unique aesthetic and character. Crucially, they also allege that, in a 2022 meeting with councillor Bridget Smith (then a GCP executive board member), they were 'promised' it would be re-routed if villagers overwhelmingly objected – which they did in a subsequent public consultation by 73 per cent. It's a 'promise' that the GCP insists was never made. The court case essentially boiled down to a 'they said, we said' row around whether the alleged 'promise' not to 'impose' the greenway on the village had been 'clear and unambiguous'. If found so, the parish council's legal team say the decision to build a greenway 'through Grantchester' should be subject to a quashing order. Either way, it's safe to say that recollections from that meeting vary. In fact, Judge Mrs Justice Lieven struggled to contain her exasperation at times. 'This is just verging on insanity,' she uttered on day one, after an intense cross-examination more befitting of a criminal trial than a judicial review. 'There is an incredibly narrow issue of fact as far as I can see here,' she said. 'It will merit very few questions.' How wrong she was. Summing up concluded on March 27, after an intense 30 pages of cross-examination by Mr Charles Streeten, who was representing the GCP – and Mrs Justice Lieven reserved judgement. She hasn't given a timescale for making her decision, but the parish council's legal team think it might be months. In the village on Thursday, as summing up was closing, villagers expressed dismay at the escalation. 'If I was the judge at the end of the first morning I'd have said, 'Why is this in court?'' says Ray Steward, 75, while perched in The Rupert Brooke pub (named after the former Grantchester-dwelling poet). Indeed, on the face of it, a greenway seems positive. A spokesperson for the GCP explains: 'The 12 greenways in Cambridge would introduce more than 150km [93 miles] of new, improved and safer routes for people to get around the local area.' Certainly some visitors (mostly non-Grantchester residents) support this view. Take cyclist Steven, 70, who stops outside the cafe, for example. He can't talk for long, he'll get chilly; helmet on, shades down, he says: 'I think it would be useful. The other option is going up the A10, and through the busier parts there you have to be careful – some bits there's cycle paths and some, it's non-existent. It would be safer [to have a cycle path], I think. A lot of people come to this village anyway – I don't think it would bring that many more.' But the problem is not visitor numbers, Steward insists. After all, the history, beauty and now TV fame of the village is already attracting more people than ever to Grantchester and, on a midweek morning, there's a smattering of day trippers tightening their backpacks here. 'We are on series 10 [of the show] – it's not going to make any difference,' he laughs. His wife Judy, 75, adds: 'It's always going to be popular; we are not worried about suddenly another 600 cyclists arriving.' They argue that there won't be many more visitors, rendering the cost and impact of implementing the greenway needless. Estimates predict a 25 per cent rise in visitors, but, in real terms, the villagers say this doesn't equate to big numbers. For one Grantchester section, Burnt Close, for example, cycle usage per 24 hours would potentially go from 26 journeys to 33 – just seven more. Although on another key stretch, the Broadway, a narrow road bordering the Meadows, the uplift is estimated to rise from 148 to 185. Instead, the key concerns for most are safety and appearance; the rural idyll eroded by signage and markings, road humps, lighting: 'Yellow paint all over the place.' Peter Scrase, 82, has lived in the village for 55 years – first in the vicarage that appears on TV ('They put up fake wisteria when they film'), now in another rectory (Grantchester has three). He describes the narrowness of the roads, especially the Broadway, where parked cars hem Charterhouse Terrace – 1870s cottages with charming front gardens dotted with hyacinths. 'If you are getting out of a car and you have a cyclist coming, you could have a very nasty accident,' he says. Even on this quiet morning, cars regularly back up eight-strong to allow others to pass, and the double decker number 18 to St Neots stands off with traffic as it navigates double bends. Scrase doesn't believe a greenway will reduce cars. 'That traffic is nothing to do with Haslingfield,' he says. 'At 7am, it's [people] trying to avoid the M11 junction.' Scrase stresses this is an 'important conservation area, a unique village… a breathing space for people,' before adding: 'The greenway will be unsightly.' The Blue Ball Inn's landlord, Toby Joseph, 65, agrees. 'It's total madness. The road is not adequate to cope with a cycle route,' he says. Even as a business-owner he sees little advantage: 'We are blessed by cyclists from Cambridge, but this would cater for something like 10 cyclists a day from Haslingfield. 'There are days when sometimes the village is a little full. I don't object at all, but this cycleway isn't to bring tourists and visitors, it's to enable people to commute from Haslingfield and they can do that perfectly adequately today.' The latter argument is the one made by the parish council, which claims other routes already exist and favours improving the pathway through the Meadows. In fact, plenty of cyclists pedal it today under circling red kites. Philip Driver, 65, from nearby Great Shelford, has walked to Grantchester for lunch. He is an 'avid cyclist' and agrees 'that would do the job'. But sitting in The Orchard Tea Garden with her newborn, Dr Emily Gomersall, 34, who lives in Haslingfield, disagrees. She cycles to Cambridge with her children, and her husband commutes by bike. Currently they go over 'bumpy' farmland with a permit, then join the roads in Grantchester anyway. She says the greenway would be safer and more direct. 'I think there are other longer options, but it's already quite a long cycle, and I think it needs to be as short as it can be to encourage people to use it,' she says. The route currently takes her husband 25 minutes, and she believes seven or eight minutes could be shaved. But where cyclists' wheels will turn now rests some 60 miles away in Mrs Justice Lieven's hands. 'We now await the judge's decision and will comment further once legal proceedings have concluded,' said the GCP. The parish council declined to comment at this stage. Mrs Justice Lieven herself might need a relaxing cycle through the Grantchester Meadows after this case concludes.
Yahoo
04-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
How a controversial cycle lane is tearing apart one of the UK's prettiest villages
The only discernible flicker of drama on a sunny Thursday morning in the tranquil Cambridgeshire village of Grantchester is when a gust sweeps a charming steel bucket off the lid of a wheelie bin (a tasteful royal-blue wheelie, at that). The crash startles those outside The Blue Ball Inn overlooking the idyllic Grantchester Meadows, where the Bloomsbury set once lolled by the River Cam. But sleepy serenity is quickly restored. Or so it seems. This is, after all, the medieval village and conservation area that hosts filming for the eponymous ITV detective drama, Grantchester (formerly starring James Norton), in which sleuthing vicars might appear cosy as toast, but tension never prickles too far behind its picket fences. And so it appears in the real-life village, too – its quaint thatched cottages masking a long-running drama of their own. A drama that, last week, peaked (some might argue farcically so) in the theatre of London's Royal Courts of Justice, where villagers found themselves a long way from their daffodils, battling a threat they claim puts their beautiful home at risk: a cycleway. On March 25, a three-day judicial review opened at the High Court, hinged around Grantchester Parish Council's objection to the construction of a greenway – a route for cyclists, walkers and horse riders – through the heart of its village, linking nearby Haslingfield to Cambridge. The case was brought against Greater Cambridge Partnership (GCP) – the committee behind the Haslingfield Greenway, made up of representatives from Cambridgeshire County Council, South Cambridgeshire District Council and Cambridge City Council – not because the parishioners (who raised £55,000 for their days in court) object to greenways, but because they insist the section through Grantchester will destroy its unique aesthetic and character. Crucially, they also allege that, in a 2022 meeting with councillor Bridget Smith (then a GCP executive board member), they were 'promised' it would be re-routed if villagers overwhelmingly objected – which they did in a subsequent public consultation by 73 per cent. It's a 'promise' that the GCP insists was never made. The court case essentially boiled down to a 'they said, we said' row around whether the alleged 'promise' not to 'impose' the greenway on the village had been 'clear and unambiguous'. If found so, the parish council's legal team say the decision to build a greenway 'through Grantchester' should be subject to a quashing order. Either way, it's safe to say that recollections from that meeting vary. In fact, Judge Mrs Justice Lieven struggled to contain her exasperation at times. 'This is just verging on insanity,' she uttered on day one, after an intense cross-examination more befitting of a criminal trial than a judicial review. 'There is an incredibly narrow issue of fact as far as I can see here,' she said. 'It will merit very few questions.' How wrong she was. Summing up concluded on March 27, after an intense 30 pages of cross-examination by Mr Charles Streeten, who was representing the GCP – and Mrs Justice Lieven reserved judgement. She hasn't given a timescale for making her decision, but the parish council's legal team think it might be months. In the village on Thursday, as summing up was closing, villagers expressed dismay at the escalation. 'If I was the judge at the end of the first morning I'd have said, 'Why is this in court?'' says Ray Steward, 75, while perched in The Rupert Brooke pub (named after the former Grantchester-dwelling poet). Indeed, on the face of it, a greenway seems positive. A spokesperson for the GCP explains: 'The 12 greenways in Cambridge would introduce more than 150km [93 miles] of new, improved and safer routes for people to get around the local area.' Certainly some visitors (mostly non-Grantchester residents) support this view. Take cyclist Steven, 70, who stops outside the cafe, for example. He can't talk for long, he'll get chilly; helmet on, shades down, he says: 'I think it would be useful. The other option is going up the A10, and through the busier parts there you have to be careful – some bits there's cycle paths and some, it's non-existent. It would be safer [to have a cycle path], I think. A lot of people come to this village anyway – I don't think it would bring that many more.' But the problem is not visitor numbers, Steward insists. After all, the history, beauty and now TV fame of the village is already attracting more people than ever to Grantchester and, on a midweek morning, there's a smattering of day trippers tightening their backpacks here. 'We are on series 10 [of the show] – it's not going to make any difference,' he laughs. His wife Judy, 75, adds: 'It's always going to be popular; we are not worried about suddenly another 600 cyclists arriving.' They argue that there won't be many more visitors, rendering the cost and impact of implementing the greenway needless. Estimates predict a 25 per cent rise in visitors, but, in real terms, the villagers say this doesn't equate to big numbers. For one Grantchester section, Burnt Close, for example, cycle usage per 24 hours would potentially go from 26 journeys to 33 – just seven more. Although on another key stretch, the Broadway, a narrow road bordering the Meadows, the uplift is estimated to rise from 148 to 185. Instead, the key concerns for most are safety and appearance; the rural idyll eroded by signage and markings, road humps, lighting: 'Yellow paint all over the place.' Peter Scrase, 82, has lived in the village for 55 years – first in the vicarage that appears on TV ('They put up fake wisteria when they film'), now in another rectory (Grantchester has three). He describes the narrowness of the roads, especially the Broadway, where parked cars hem Charterhouse Terrace – 1870s cottages with charming front gardens dotted with hyacinths. 'If you are getting out of a car and you have a cyclist coming, you could have a very nasty accident,' he says. Even on this quiet morning, cars regularly back up eight-strong to allow others to pass, and the double decker number 18 to St Neots stands off with traffic as it navigates double bends. Scrase doesn't believe a greenway will reduce cars. 'That traffic is nothing to do with Haslingfield,' he says. 'At 7am, it's [people] trying to avoid the M11 junction.' Scrase stresses this is an 'important conservation area, a unique village… a breathing space for people,' before adding: 'The greenway will be unsightly.' The Blue Ball Inn's landlord, Toby Joseph, 65, agrees. 'It's total madness. The road is not adequate to cope with a cycle route,' he says. Even as a business-owner he sees little advantage: 'We are blessed by cyclists from Cambridge, but this would cater for something like 10 cyclists a day from Haslingfield. 'There are days when sometimes the village is a little full. I don't object at all, but this cycleway isn't to bring tourists and visitors, it's to enable people to commute from Haslingfield and they can do that perfectly adequately today.' The latter argument is the one made by the parish council, which claims other routes already exist and favours improving the pathway through the Meadows. In fact, plenty of cyclists pedal it today under circling red kites. Philip Driver, 65, from nearby Great Shelford, has walked to Grantchester for lunch. He is an 'avid cyclist' and agrees 'that would do the job'. But sitting in The Orchard Tea Garden with her newborn, Dr Emily Gomersall, 34, who lives in Haslingfield, disagrees. She cycles to Cambridge with her children, and her husband commutes by bike. Currently they go over 'bumpy' farmland with a permit, then join the roads in Grantchester anyway. She says the greenway would be safer and more direct. 'I think there are other longer options, but it's already quite a long cycle, and I think it needs to be as short as it can be to encourage people to use it,' she says. The route currently takes her husband 25 minutes, and she believes seven or eight minutes could be shaved. But where cyclists' wheels will turn now rests some 60 miles away in Mrs Justice Lieven's hands. 'We now await the judge's decision and will comment further once legal proceedings have concluded,' said the GCP. The parish council declined to comment at this stage. Mrs Justice Lieven herself might need a relaxing cycle through the Grantchester Meadows after this case concludes. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
BBC News
07-02-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Housing targets are being implemented too fast, says councillor
The government's new housing targets could lead to more "uncontrolled development" and were being implemented "too fast" in an area, according to Greater Cambridge Shared Planning (GCSP) service said the fact the housing targets took effect immediately meant their five-year "land supply" was now service - covering Cambridge City and South Cambridgeshire - has had a local plan in place, but after the targets were increased the councils needed to create a new plan, showing how they would meet the councils do not have an adequate plan then some developments, which may not be what the councils want, are more likely to get planning permission. "Land supply" means land that has planning permission for new homes and is likely to be built on within five years. According to a statement issued by the GCSP, the housing target for the two councils was increased by around a third, from 1,726 to 2,309 homes per year. They say a buffer has also been introduced which, combined with the increase, means the service needs to be able to demonstrate they will build more than 12,100 homes in the Greater Cambridge area over five GCSP reported in April 2024 that the housing trajectory for the five-year period from 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2029 was 11,190 homes, equating to a demonstrated supply of 6.5 years prior to the changes in December 2024. However, with the new target set by government increasing to 12,100, effective immediately, the supply has fallen to just under five years. The immediacy of the new housing targets has caused concern among the Liberal Democrat leadership at South Cambridgeshire District cabinet member for planning, Tumi Hawkins, said the "guidance has been implemented too fast" and called for a transition views were echoed by leader Bridget Smith, who said the "inflexibility risks compromising" their ability to build "new, high quality affordable homes". 'Challenges' Conservative opposition leader Heather Williams said she feared it would lead to unsustainable developments. "This is not just about where houses are built," she said."It's about our communities, some of which may grow out of control as a consequence – putting more pressure on local schools and GP surgeries."The executive councillor for planning, building control and infrastructure on the Labour-run Cambridge City Council, Katie Thornburrow, said she recognised that "changing the target for new homes with immediate effect creates some challenges", but said she was confident they could be said: "As part of preparing our next housing trajectory report to be published in April 2025, planning officers will explore options to remove barriers and speed up the delivery of the 36,000 new homes that already have planning permission in Greater Cambridge, as well as identifying suitable future developments – such as the council's own housebuilding programme – in order to meet the new target." Follow Cambridgeshire news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.
BBC News
27-01-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Consultation on Cambridgeshire council's four-day working week
People can have their say on how they have found services since the council started working a four-day Cambridgeshire District Council began the trial for desk-based staff in January 2023 to help address recruitment and retention leader, Bridget Smith, approved the scheme where employees would deliver 100% of their work, in around 80% of their hours, for 100% of their consultation for people to share their views will be open for eight weeks, closing at 23:59 GMT on 23 March. Information gathered during the consultation will help district councillors decide the next steps for the four-day cabinet member for resources, John Williams, said: "We'd really appreciate residents taking the time to respond to this consultation. "It's always been our plan to give residents, businesses, parish and town councils and community groups the chance to share their views. "Our approach is designed to ensure those who have used our services during the four-day week arrangements can quickly and easily share their views - though anyone, anywhere is welcome to submit comments."The four-day week aimed to improve services by filling vacant posts permanently, rather than relying on more expensive agency staff. Mike Davey, leader of Cambridge City Council, said: "The most important factor for us has always been ensuring our residents continue to receive high quality, reliable services, and we have been keeping a close eye on this throughout – the frequency of bin collections hasn't changed, and the planning service has been open for business five days a week throughout. "We want our residents' voices to be heard – if you're a Cambridge resident please take part." Follow Cambridgeshire news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.
