Lost Cambridge

The emerging local plan for Greater Cambridge (City and South Cambridgeshire) provided an impetus to explore previous local housing and transport plans. After nearly two years away from the camcorder, I started producing some vlogposts again – until an unexpected heart attack brought that to an abrupt end. Fortunately for me, the staff at Addenbrooke’s … More What Lost Cambridge rediscovered in 2021 – a review and summary

People familiar with Eglantyne Jebb may well know that she was arrested, prosecuted, and fined for handing out protest leaflets on starving children in Austria six months after the Armistice. It even gets a mention on the Save the Children international webpage. For those of you who have not read Eglantyne’s biography, see Clare Mulley … More Eglantyne Jebb prosecuted for handing out protest leaflets without permission from the military censor. May 1919.

An inevitably censored/self-censored article in the Cambridge Independent Press on 01 Jan 1915 hints at some of the struggles the Borough of Cambridge faced. Put simply, local government did not have the infrastructure to respond to the demands suddenly placed upon it. The voluntary response from the town, while worthy, could never cover everything equally, … More The Soldiers’ Christmas – Winter 1914

Thirty-six years old is no age to die – especially for someone with so much potential and so much more ahead of her. Yet that was how old one of my former councillors, Cllr Ruth Bagnall (Lab – Coleridge, when she died in 2004. You can read her obituary here. Above – Cllr Ruth Bagnall … More Cllr Ruth Bagnall – one of the best MPs Cambridge never had.

Prof John Parry Lewis’s proposals to double the size of the city and create a new urban centre south of Trumpington are finally rejected by councillors From The Cambridge Evening News, 29 Oct 1974 – written by Peter Hoskins, transcribed from the copy in the Cambridgeshire Collection’s planning cuttings file “The Parry Lewis super plan … More “Top officials reject city super-plans” – Cambridge 1974

We have: The Greater Cambridge Local Plan (emerging) The Local Transport & Connectivity Plan (Cambs & P’boro) The Greater Cambridge Partnership Bus Network consultations titled “Making Connections” (along with what look like much-reduced proposals for Cambridge Eastern Access). These require a huge amount of reading if you want to get into the detail. You don’t have to … More Historical Cambridge documents informing current housing and transport consultations – 2021

I start off this blogpost with a video from the Cambridgeshire Collection which starts with an appeal for residents in and around Cambridge to find out more about the consultation on the Greater Cambridge Plan for 2030-41. The video also ends with my appeal for support for my research via https://ko-fi.com/antonycarpen With the permission of … More The Romsey Local Plan 1986 and a proposal for a station at Addenbrooke’s in the 1990s

Speculative proposals were submitted by James A. Quinlan & Associates on behalf of a consortium of landowners, but were rejected following their presentation to the Examination in Public of the Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Structure Plan in late 2002. I raised the issue of digitising past historical council documents at the Full Council meeting of 21 … More Why did Cambridgeshire County Council reject the Six Mile Bottom Light Railway plan in February 2003?

I’m hoping Cambridge City Council will enable this paper commissioned by them can be digitised and made public along with their past historical papers stored in archives. The same goes for the surrounding district councils & Cambridgeshire County Council given that the Mayor of Cambridgeshire & Peterborough is soon to go to consultation on a … More Abandoned proposals for Cambridge Light Rail Transport – 1991 by Colin Buchanan & Partners

I spent this afternoon recording a piece to camera having stumbled across a series of documents two undergraduates studying Architecture at Cambridge were looking at for their project. Reviewing the footage it looks like I’ll have to re-shoot it because I spent too long looking down! *Don’t look down, there’s only shoes and floor and … More Why did it all kick off in The Kite, Cambridge? The redevelopment plans from the late 1960s speak volumes