Author Archives: Cambridge Town Owl

In a nutshell there isn’t enough of it, and there are some easy wins that Cambridge City Council and the Greater Cambridge Shared Planning Service are missing out on. At the foot of the poster I state who I am (“With local historian Antony Carpen”) because I don’t want anyone to get the impression I’mContinue reading “Offline publicity for Future of Cambridge proposals”

Live to work, or work to live? Continuing on the theme of Loneliness in 2026 In my further reading on Loneliness in Society and the multiple articles now coming out regularly on our individual struggles to find community and belonging (I found another one in The Guardian here for 2025, along with Malala’s take forContinue reading “When your day job becomes your identity – Loneliness in society”

A short post on a recently-formed support group in Cambridge that meets at The Alex Pub on Gwydir Street The group was formed by Angela Brown who you can contact via the above-two links. The significant underfunding of neurodiverse health services – in particular ADHD in Cambridgeshire is grim – have a look at theContinue reading “Cambridge ADHD Group”

The proposals were rejected in 2013 by Cambridge City Council and South Cambridgeshire District Council in the creation of what became the current local plan of 2018 – but with Peter Freeman’s Cambridge Growth Company instructed to grow Cambridge beyond what the emerging local plan accounts for, will we need to revisit this? See theContinue reading “Revisiting the abandoned Cambridge Sporting Village 2013”

This was in 1994 and were the feelings of former Perse School headmaster Martin Stephen in an interview with the Cambridge Evening News shortly before his departure for Manchester. “I think there is more loneliness in Cambridge than any other city I have ever known” Martin Stephens in the Cambridge Evening News 21 July 1994,Continue reading “Former headteacher described Cambridge as having ‘more loneliness than any city he had ever known’”

In June 2021 the House of Commons Library published this briefing on loneliness in society. Nearly five years later how far have we come? Image – Tackling loneliness hub which is being funded by the Government (which includes this blogpost by the Minister) I’m writing this in the context of my own experiences past andContinue reading “Loneliness in society 2026”

Another report in the consultation annexes on the future of Cambridge / Greater Cambridge Emerging Local Plan for you to look at It’s in the document library – scroll down until you get to the Infrastructure subheading as below. Above – it’ll be the document just below the bottom row illustrated here. (And if theContinue reading “North East Cambridge – what infrastructure does it need?”

Alongside their inclusion in the Combined Authority Mayor’s Local Growth Plan, might we be getting somewhere with this after 65 years of trying? Also, what does contemporary history tell us about new facilities and amenities for Cambridge? I wanted to come back to this issue that I wrote about in my extended previous blogpost whichContinue reading “Concert hall and conference centre included at Cambridge East in new local plan”

Applying the conclusions of recent national reports to East Cambridge – where Abbey Ward is one of the most economically-deprived in Cambridgeshire ICYMI – see the Cambridge Civic Quarter planning applications here Only I missed them and will probably spend between now and the New Year going through them! Only the deadline for comments isContinue reading “Using new large civic projects to design out poverty”

And can their county councillors intervene to pull the application, change the architects and commission someone different to come up with a better design? Turns out it’s Essex County Council (or more specifically their pension fund) that is the applicant according to Bidwells. Above – confirmation from Bidwells 18 Dec 2025 to Cambridge City CouncilContinue reading “Why does Essex County Council want to impose an ugly carbuncle on Cambridge?”