Author Archives: Cambridge Town Owl

The selection of Lambeth Councillor Marianna Masters (Labour – Streatham Wells) as Labour’s MP-candidate for St Neots and Mid-Cambridgeshire has caused more than a little comment in a contest that might otherwise have seen a rematch between the three candidates that stood in South Cambridgeshire in 2019 The first anyone heard about it was aContinue reading “Labour selects Cllr Marianna Masters as their candidate for the new St Neots & Mid Cambs seat”

I’m old enough to remember civil service lectures on the importance of evidence-based policy-making. But what can we do if ministerial and executive-level decision-makers repeatedly ignore the evidence, resulting in our collective loss? Image: From the book How to be a global citizen Climate campaigner Lauren MacDonald from Glasgow gave this speech a year agoContinue reading “Lauren MacDonald’s masterclass on how our political and economic systems are failing in the climate emergency”

Will we get a splendid new civic quarter or will we end up with Brookgate-style blandness? See https://cambridgecivicquarter.co.uk/ for the details My own vision is a little different – have a look here. Above – inspiration from Graz City Hall in Austria (which I visited back in the mid-2000s) that provide for a nice template ofContinue reading “Cambridge Civic Quarter launches”

The Civil Society Consulting Community Interest Company published their guide in 2022 – but following the steps is easier said than done You can read their guide here. I’m not picking on this guide over the many others other than I stumbled across it/it was there. Furthermore, the criticisms and comments are more for theContinue reading “The structural barriers to following the 32 Steps to Togetherness guide”

It can seem overwhelming with all that is happening in and around our city, but we’ve faced similar challenges in decades gone by – eras that saw huge social, political, cultural, and technological changes that were not easy to predict ICYMI you can: My previous two blogposts refer to both of these. If your firstContinue reading “Creating collective responses to the Cambridge Biomedical Campus Housing Report”

The CBC has published a study produced by Lichfields on the back of Michael Gove’s announcement yesterday You can read the press release here and scroll down to the link to the report. This follows Michael Gove’s statement to Parliament on 08 April 2024 which I wrote about here. And their headline findings are… TheContinue reading “Cambridge Biomedical Campus Housing Study – April 2024”

A written statement to Parliament dropped in earlier today – which will also make for intense debate in the reoriented constituency of South Cambridgeshire too You can read Michael Gove’s statement here “Part of the Cambridge Delivery Group’s [CDG) strategy is to focus on enabling and accelerating key developments that align with the overall strategyContinue reading “Government says Cambridge Biomedical Campus to progress faster than the Local Plan”

The campaign group Living Streets (originally founded as the Pedestrians’ Association in the 1930s) published two detailed reports on bus stops by cycleways, and continuous footpaths. You can read the reports here You can also read the Neighbourhood Public Square Report by Civic Square which covers wider issues on a practical basis here. Above –Continue reading “How do you retrofit a city for walking and cycling?”

Famous last words? You can see the results here, where Coleridge councillor Anna Smith narrowed the gap further between Labour and Tories, but was unable to bridge the gap created by ministers changing the voting system for the Police & Crime Commissioner Elections from the supplementary vote (a choice of a top preference & thenContinue reading “Don’t count your political chickens before…so who won what?”

Me and Ellie Breeze (or is that ‘Ellie and I’?) of Together Culture tried out an alternative way of getting people through the door to discuss their issues with council candidates. We managed to persuade…one person! With thanks to: ….for giving up their time to participate. Part of the deal was that Ellie and IContinue reading “‘We don’t do politics’ – a snapshot in time”