What laws would you come up with to encourage more of us to play in our city? That was the question put to local children in my part of town over the past couple of weeks.
As it turned out, a number of families crossed ward boundaries (because no one lives their lives by council boundaries -do they?) to get to the free events being funded by developer contributions to Cambridge City Council – the next one is on Parker’s Piece on 07-09 July 2023.
The one at Coleridge Rec recently happened to be a place with trees.
Above – former Cllr Hilary Cox-Condron. “I hope you have filled out the relevant health and safety forms prior to undertaking such a dangerous activity!!!”
Listening to a couple of the parents who brought their children along, I got a better picture from them about how our city under-provides for children and young people. The blunt message came from the primary-school-aged daughter of one of the parents who told me about the lack of play facilities at her school – hence her final suggestion below when I asked her for her three suggestions to improve Cambridge for children.
Above – a twirly water slide, a park that families and their pets can play in that is separate to the play areas that say “no dogs allowed” (Queen Edith’s ward tried something similar in recent times if I recall correctly – think Crufts on a shoestring!), and fun play equipment.
With one of the parents having connections within the University of Cambridge but having come to the UK from abroad (her children are perfectly bi-lingual) I was told how so much in Cambridge as elsewhere seems to involve a ‘hard sell’ where you are always expected to buy something – and not everyone can. When the parent mentioned this to me a little voice piped up and said:
“That’s not fair!”
Which was all the more interesting because said child only a few minutes ago had told us they did not like politics! So I said to the child I’d be voting for them when they turned 18!
Encouraging children to call out those inequalities is not a bad thing – if anything our institutions could be making it easier for children to voice their concerns about the future they are going to inherit – one that has been looking miserable for years.
This matters – especially in a city as unequal as Cambridge. Because one of the most prestigious private schools in the country (The Perse) has started work on its own private swimming pool, due to open in autumn 2024, yet as I’ve mentioned before the University of Cambridge is still dragging its feet over the construction of its long-promised swimming pool in West Cambridge – despite the University and its member colleges raising over £2.2billion from its alumni. The decision-makers in the colleges and the institutions that make up the University had the choices to make on how to allocate that funding. Given the projected population increases on top of those of the past generation, I’d say both the west and north Cambridge proposals are needed.
It’s one of the reasons why I have been lobbying anyone reasonably influential who will listen that Cambridge needs a public swimming pool to serve the communities of North Cambridge who don’t have a large one – despite the significant increase in population of our city since the opening of Parkside in the early 1960s. (See my article here, and also my video here.)
“Hang on – don’t we have a water crisis?”
We do. Hence Anglian Water were forced to bring forward their pipeline proposals sooner than originally anticipated. Whether the water will be flowing before 2030 remains to be seen – especially given the demand from the new science parks popping up all over the place.
“Simply put, without the new water main grid, demand for water could outstrip supply as soon as 2030.”
Anglian Water – 27 April 2023
“How do we prevent Cambridge from failing yet another generation of children and teenagers?”
I was reminded of architect Thom Holbrook’s comment in his presentation to the Academy of Urbanism last week. Cambridge has consistently under-provided for children and teenagers for decades. Part of that conversation has to involve educating the wider public about how our political systems function and malfunction. Yet such has been the impact of the cuts to adult education budgets that there is nothing in place to compensate for my generation of 1990s teenagers who were taught nothing about the essentials of democracy and the law. And yet we’re told “ignorance of the law is no excuse”. Yes it f–king is if ministers choose to omit it from school curricula. Instead they could do the opposite and make it so much easier for people to learn about it. Political choices. Choices.
Above – a variety of different reading approaches – whether aimed at younger readers, those that want to get active but not necessarily arrested, and for those in sci-tech worlds who (understandably) despise party politics but who might be able to help things to learn more about the interface between science policy and decision-making in Westminster & Whitehall.
Alternatives to an Open Cambridge event about the growth of Cambridge
I wrote about this recently, but the alternative below also sounds devastatingly effective from Sam Smith.
Sobering prospect, isn’t it? It reminds me of the austerity of 2010 onwards when ministers cut both ringfences in and budgets (i.e. reduced significantly the grants from central government) to local councils. Thus giving local councils the grim choice of which services to cut and by how much. A horrible place to be put in.
What would you demand of the developers in return?
Send your comments to them – whether about rail links, transport, provision for children & teenagers, housing, water supplies, pollution – the lot.
- The Grafton Centre redevelopment
- The Beehive Centre
- Westbrook off Milton Road
- Fulbourn Hospital site
- Cambridge Science Park North
- Hartree / the current sewage works site
- Cambridge Biomedical Campus
- Land south of Coldham’s Lane
- Cambridge East – the airport redevelopment (and see my blogpost here)
Put all of those together, and you can see my point about both light rail (https://www.cambridge-connect.uk/) and upgraded heavy/regional rail.
Hence I’ve tabled another public question to the Combined Authority’s Transport Committee (you can table one too and have it read out on your behalf) asking the Committee to direct officers to meet with developers and their representatives to see what impact all of these proposals will have on the emerging Local Transport & Connectivity Plan – and what contributions developers can make towards upgrading rail lines and building new stations. In the meantime you can look at the agendas for Cambridgeshire County Council’s Highways & Transport Committee here, and the details of last week’s Planning & Transport Scrutiny Committee of Cambridge City Council here, and also last weeks’ GCP Board Meeting also on all things transport. You’ll have to ask ministers why Cambridge needs *four* different transport-related committees to deal with things in and around our city. As they signed it all off.
Food for thought?
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The Cambridge Town Owl 