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Centre for British Progress had released a piece of work recommending properly going all out on the Oxford Cambridge axis by having a development corporation for the whole area which would have the powers to call in all the planning powers in the region as well as the powers of people like Natural England.
They would also have the powers to capture land value either by charging land owners directly or by acquiring land and then granting themselves planning permission and either developing the land or by selling it on.
This would allow them to build infrastructure without recourse to treasury. The intention was that this development corporation would report direct to the PM or Chancellor and would be free from civil service restrictions so could hire proper commercial people and project managers.
Given that said new land users would then pay a whole load of tax this venture would provide a substantial surplus to the treasury, hence allowing levelling up elsewhere and getting rid of those fairness arguments that normally come out on infrastructure spending in the South East.
The 100-mile corridor between Oxford and Cambridge is one of the most exciting stretches of land in the world — but today it isn’t doing enough for Britain’s economy as a whole.
Centre for British Progress had released a piece of work recommending properly going all out on the Oxford Cambridge axis by having a development corporation for the whole area which would have the powers to call in all the planning powers in the region as well as the powers of people like Natural England.
Thanks for sharing this. One of the authors is Kane Emerson, it is the sort of stuff that I would expect him to say. The authors demonstrate that they know little and care less about Cambridge, its geography, history, economy and politics. These are the things that have already nurtured significant economic growth in the last 10-15 years, despite not because of the contribution from the centre.
No the Oxford-Cambridge corridor does not need a development corporation for the whole of the corridor. Cambridge will get the development corporation that it needs evolved out of the Cambridge Growth Company. Peter Freeman has done a lot of local engagement as part of this, and recruited a team with a lot of local knowledge. Greater Cambridge Shared Panning (covering both the City of Cambridge and South Cambridgeshire) is currently consulting on a draft local plan. There is an informed and engaged local population that contributes to the planning process, and usually this leads to better outcomes. Growth needs to come through local planning, not through riding roughshod over the people who live here, and who are going to be contributing to delivering the growth.
What Cambridge does need is more consistent support from the centre both politically and financially. Politically that means having a Central Government Project Board for delivering the Oxford-Cambridge corridor, to get Treasury, Housing, Transport and Environment all pulling together in the same direction. It means avoiding fiascos like the Honey Hill sewage works saga. It means getting East West Rail moving faster. It means getting the local government reorganisation right to deliver effectively, note that we have already done part of this here with Greater Cambridge Shared Planning, without waiting to be asked.
The one area where an institution covering all of the corridor could be useful is financial, an umbrella organisation that could borrow directly from the financial markets, and then lend to the development corporations in the corridor. But the authors don't help themselves here with exaggerated assertions about how much that can be raised through land value uplift, and significant underestimates of the amount and cost of the infrastructure required for Cambridge to grow. For example, they don't mention the £2-3 billion that we need to replace the A+E department at Addenbrookes (which now runs at 3-4 times its design capacity), and anyone who thinks that Cambridge can get a tram network for £2 billion clearly hasn't been here.
I have already spent too much time on this, I really ought to be composing my contribution to the local plan consultation!
Centre for British Progress had released a piece of work recommending properly going all out on the Oxford Cambridge axis by having a development corporation for the whole area which would have the powers to call in all the planning powers in the region as well as the powers of people like Natural England.
Sounds like a really good idea, especially as anything Cambridge/ Cambridgeshire is really fragmented and messy when it comes to local government. I wish something similar existed for the Green Belt around London. Development really needs coordination and at scale.
They would also have the powers to capture land value either by charging land owners directly or by acquiring land and then granting themselves planning permission and either developing the land or by selling it on.
This would allow them to build infrastructure without recourse to treasury. The intention was that this development corporation would report direct to the PM or Chancellor and would be free from civil service restrictions so could hire proper commercial people and project managers.
Given that said new land users would then pay a whole load of tax this venture would provide a substantial surplus to the treasury, hence allowing levelling up elsewhere and getting rid of those fairness arguments that normally come out on infrastructure spending in the South East.
A councillor is hoping to revitalise the drive for a city centre residential university.
www.bbc.co.uk
A politician is trying to revitalise attempts to bring a university campus to the centre of Milton Keynes.
Sam Crooks, a Liberal Democrat councillor, says a residential university in the middle of the city would turn it into "the marker at the centre" of the Oxford-Cambridge Arc.
He will be asking the city council, at its next full meeting, to invite local education providers to a conference to discuss the situation.
Thanks for sharing this. One of the authors is Kane Emerson, it is the sort of stuff that I would expect him to say. The authors demonstrate that they know little and care less about Cambridge, its geography, history, economy and politics. These are the things that have already nurtured significant economic growth in the last 10-15 years, despite not because of the contribution from the centre.
No the Oxford-Cambridge corridor does not need a development corporation for the whole of the corridor. Cambridge will get the development corporation that it needs evolved out of the Cambridge Growth Company. Peter Freeman has done a lot of local engagement as part of this, and recruited a team with a lot of local knowledge. Greater Cambridge Shared Panning (covering both the City of Cambridge and South Cambridgeshire) is currently consulting on a draft local plan. There is an informed and engaged local population that contributes to the planning process, and usually this leads to better outcomes. Growth needs to come through local planning, not through riding roughshod over the people who live here, and who are going to be contributing to delivering the growth.
What Cambridge does need is more consistent support from the centre both politically and financially. Politically that means having a Central Government Project Board for delivering the Oxford-Cambridge corridor, to get Treasury, Housing, Transport and Environment all pulling together in the same direction. It means avoiding fiascos like the Honey Hill sewage works saga. It means getting East West Rail moving faster. It means getting the local government reorganisation right to deliver effectively, note that we have already done part of this here with Greater Cambridge Shared Planning, without waiting to be asked.
The one area where an institution covering all of the corridor could be useful is financial, an umbrella organisation that could borrow directly from the financial markets, and then lend to the development corporations in the corridor. But the authors don't help themselves here with exaggerated assertions about how much that can be raised through land value uplift, and significant underestimates of the amount and cost of the infrastructure required for Cambridge to grow. For example, they don't mention the £2-3 billion that we need to replace the A+E department at Addenbrookes (which now runs at 3-4 times its design capacity), and anyone who thinks that Cambridge can get a tram network for £2 billion clearly hasn't been here.
I have already spent too much time on this, I really ought to be composing my contribution to the local plan consultation!
Ah but who is advocating for the people who don't currently live or work in the Cambridge area but would like to?
I have looked at the Greater Cambridge plan and I'd suggest that it is rather limited in its ambitions, greater Cambridge currently has a population of 300,000. The plan is to have another 73,000 jobs in the area by 2045. Which if we assume a ratio of jobs to population in line with the rest of the country equates to a 50% uplift in population or a 2% annual population growth rate which isn't that much more than the national population growth rate of 1.1%.
I think there is a fair thesis that growth in the greater Cambridge area is potentially pretty much unlimited (see current house prices), if all planning restraints were removed we'd see a pretty massive city in that area especially once agglomeration economics starting taking hold. I'd suggest that the local plan should be that we let a massive city get built in the area but do so in the least damaging way possible.
It's not like there is a lack of space, if we increased greater Cambridges population to 1,000,000 by 2045 but built most of the new housing at Westminster densities then we would need an extra 70km2 of land developed (this includes green spaces). This would be developing only 7.5% of the land in the area so would not change the character of the area massively, particularly as a lot of the building would be densification of existing built up land. Building a city of 1 million in that area would be a challenge but it still equates to a 6% annual population growth rate over 20 years so is not unprecedented. Note that I say building a city in that area, I would not propose building the centre of Cambridge to much greater density nor building tall buildings there.
Having 1 million residents there would completely overwhelm the local transport and infrastructure, which is why you would need a big organisation with proper borrowing powers and the ability to force through infrastructure. Building a cross city tunnel tram or even a Cambridge CrossRail would be perfectly affordable in the context of building Greater Cambridge up to be a national scale metropolis. Allowing densification actually increases the land values for existing owners so it's not just a detriment to existing locals.
If nationally we want to move the needle on making the UK a wealthy place we actually have to be bold and stop restricting development where people actually want it. That will give us the revenues to deal with things like dealing with an aging population, building a military capable of putting off Trump/Putin/Xi, levelling up and all the new infrastructure we need.
The growth of Cambridge is limited and the main limiting factor is water supply.
There are already plans for new water infrastructure, a pipeline from Grafham Water expected to be delivered in 2032 and a new Reservoir in the Fens expected to be completed in 2036.
Plans for proposed Fens Reservoir set back after water regulators said the project is not yet ready for next major approval stage.
www.watermagazine.co.uk
Plans for the proposed Fens Reservoir have been set back after water regulators said the project is not yet ready for its next major approval stage.
The Regulators’ Alliance for Progressing Infrastructure Development (RAPID), which oversees large water supply schemes in England, has told Anglian Water and Cambridge Water to delay submitting the “Gate Three” application for the reservoir beyond the previously agreed deadline of 30 April 2026.
In a letter published this week, RAPID said that whilst progress has been made, important aspects of the scheme still require further development. These include refining design options, confirming how the reservoir would be filled with water, and addressing environmental protection requirements.
Anglian Water's planner warns we need more rain and says the risk of more serious droughts is growing.
www.bbc.co.uk
A senior official at Anglian Water (AW) has told a parliamentary committee the region is still getting over last year's drought.
Geoff Darch, AW's head of strategic planning, told members of the House of Lords "we have lots of resilience but it takes time to replenish", adding he was hoping for a full winter's average rainfall.
He also warned climate change and the building of new homes and businesses was putting pressure on water supplies and the risk of further droughts in the east was "a significant concern".
I have looked at the Greater Cambridge plan and I'd suggest that it is rather limited in its ambitions, greater Cambridge currently has a population of 300,000. The plan is to have another 73,000 jobs in the area by 2045.
The Greater Cambridge Draft Local Plan is limited because it is drawn up under an old process, and work has been going on since at least 2021. It is widely recognised that it is a baseline and that the work of the Cambridge Growth Company, plus the consequences of recent planning legislation and proposed changes to the National Planning Policy Framework, will open up more land for development. But those are beyond the remit of the draft local plan process, trying to incorporate them would mean junking the work already done and starting again, which pushes development back not forward.
The plan is to have another 73,000 jobs in the area by 2045. Which if we assume a ratio of jobs to population in line with the rest of the country equates to a 50% uplift in population or a 2% annual population growth rate which isn't that much more than the national population growth rate of 1.1%.
2% population growth is almost double the national figure you quote of 1.1%.
Cambridge plus South Cambridgeshire getting to a population of 500k is implicit in the proposal for the Greater Cambridge unitary authority consisting only of Cambridge and South Cambridgeshire.
But another factor limits the pace of development and that is construction industry capacity. Even if there are plans to build lots more houses, it still needs people to build them.
Even Crossrail did not include digging tunnel under a river. A tunnel under Cambridge won't happen. It would be very expensive and very disruptive. And the key point is that a tunnel isn't necessary. What's needed is a transport network that diverts traffic away from the old centre all of the traffic that is only passing through. Although Greater Cambridge is growing rapidly, the old centre is not, because it has nowhere to expand, and it isn't where expensive new infrastructure is needed.
The growth of Cambridge is limited and the main limiting factor is water supply.
There are already plans for new water infrastructure, a pipeline from Grafham Water expected to be delivered in 2032 and a new Reservoir in the Fens expected to be completed in 2036.
The big question mark about the new reservoir isn't building the infrastructure, it is how to fill it with water.
We are a rich country that lives on an island, nowhere is more than 70 miles from the sea and most of the country is pretty rainy. If we are constrained by water what we really mean is that we are constrained by processes and living with those processes for so long that we lose our imagination and assume that it takes decades to do anything.
Desalination technology exists and if we could replicate Israeli costs per m3 of water you wouldn’t notice them on your water bill (Severn Trent charge me £2.5/m3 of water, Israel desalinates for less than 30p/m3). Furthermore desalination technology is factory built modules and thus can both scale well and also exhibits good learner effects as you bring most of the same technology and engineering to each site.
Israel are a tiny country by comparison to the UK so we should easily have the capability to do this and were we to integrate it into a strategy to localise and improve the technology it is an area that the UK could lead on, it's not like people are going to start using less water worldwide.
The Greater Cambridge Draft Local Plan is limited because it is drawn up under an old process, and work has been going on since at least 2021. It is widely recognised that it is a baseline and that the work of the Cambridge Growth Company, plus the consequences of recent planning legislation and proposed changes to the National Planning Policy Framework, will open up more land for development. But those are beyond the remit of the draft local plan process, trying to incorporate them would mean junking the work already done and starting again, which pushes development back not forward.
I don't disagree in principle but we do tend to find that attempting to do things within the system slows things down in practice and that while you might have a set up cost to doing something different once you have done that you can go much faster. Things only go slow because we have decided they go slow and because we have a lot of decision points and lots of public bodies with contrary objectives and incentives.
Both numbers are relatively small, they are numbers where you might notice things change over the course of a lifetime but not something dramatic. 6% would need planning but it is very far from what can be achieved Shenzhen went from 300,000 to 1,000,000 in 7 years! The Oxford-Cambridge arc has massive potential but for population and GDP growth that could be redistributed around the country.
But another factor limits the pace of development and that is construction industry capacity. Even if there are plans to build lots more houses, it still needs people to build them.
There is difference between ramp up time and fundamental capacity, as previous mentioned other countries have managed to move a large proportion of their population from villages to cities within a generation while expanding their population massively at the same time. We haven't improved productivity in construction all over the last few decades because we haven't needed to, we have aways been constrained by permission and by ambition. Everything is handmade and built to order by a workforce that changes jobsite daily. It only takes a few months to turn someone in a adjacent industry into a construction person and it only takes a few years to make them competent and flexible.
In WWII we built a greater length of runways than the post war motorway network in less than 5 years, with a lower population and with millions of people away in uniforms fighting. I would be surprised if those people building said runways were trained and experienced in doing so at the start of the war.
Even Crossrail did not include digging tunnel under a river. A tunnel under Cambridge won't happen. It would be very expensive and very disruptive. And the key point is that a tunnel isn't necessary. What's needed is a transport network that diverts traffic away from the old centre all of the traffic that is only passing through. Although Greater Cambridge is growing rapidly, the old centre is not, because it has nowhere to expand, and it isn't where expensive new infrastructure is needed.
I agree with most of this, that cross city tram network wasn't my work. It was more the point that if you have the ambition to build at scale then the public transport costs required to support it will always be proportionately quite affordable. The centre of Cambridge is small and walkable thus a tram/train public transport network arguably doesn't need to penetrate it to put everywhere inside it within a 300m walk of a stop.
Also I think if you were to do a plan to get Greater Cambridge up to 1 million plus people you would probably design it as a polycentric area so most people would be travelling between these centres rather than travelling in to the medieval core. They key bit is to have the ambitious plan because otherwise you are going to have the chicken and the egg problem. There are for example 2 story semi detached houses that are 100m from Cambridge Railway station, if that was the core of a metropolis those really should be turned into 4 story town houses or mansion blocks (something that would make current owners rich) doubling population density. You could free planning to do street votes and similar which might make that happen but city wide you'd have the very obvious concern that the new residents would have nowhere to park and no way to get to their site of employment. So some sort of enhanced public transport is needed. Autonomous buses I expect will be part of the answer.
In WWII we built a greater length of runways than the post war motorway network in less than 5 years, with a lower population and with millions of people away in uniforms fighting. I would be surprised if those people building said runways were trained and experienced in doing so at the start of the war.
The west side of the island is rainy, the east side is dry. Cambridge is on the east side, in the driest bit of the east side. It is literally hundreds of miles away from the rainy bits.
Cambridge is also more than 50 miles from the sea.
Desalination technology exists and if we could replicate Israeli costs per m3 of water you wouldn’t notice them on your water bill (Severn Trent charge me £2.5/m3 of water, Israel desalinates for less than 30p/m3). Furthermore desalination technology is factory built modules and thus can both scale well and also exhibits good learner effects as you bring most of the same technology and engineering to each site.
There are 2 huge geographical differences between here and Israel. One is tides, which in Israel are effectively non-existent. The other is winter storms, of which we have already had three this month.
Then there is the cost of electricity, which would be needed to power the desalination plants, and to power the pumps to move the water uphill, because desalination plants are at sea level. All pipeline routes from the sea to Cambridge, bar one, involve pumping the water up to 100 metres above sea level or more, to get over the watershed. The exception is the Wash, where a 50 mile pipeline through the Fens would lose much of the water through leakage, because the pipe would fracture under the stresses and strains of differential expansion and contraction of the peat.
Both numbers are relatively small, they are numbers where you might notice things change over the course of a lifetime but not something dramatic. 6% would need planning but it is very far from what can be achieved Shenzhen went from 300,000 to 1,000,000 in 7 years!
Schenzen may have tripled in size in 7 years but China is a very rich country that runs a huge trade surplus and isn't in debt. China can afford to do things that the UK can't. China is also still in the early stage of development where various things have not become unacceptable yet.
There is difference between ramp up time and fundamental capacity, as previous mentioned other countries have managed to move a large proportion of their population from villages to cities within a generation while expanding their population massively at the same time.
That's done by countries at the early stage of economic development. The UK did it during the Industrial Revolution. It involved slum living, child and slave labour, and at the cost of many lives. That includes the thousands of navvies that died during the construction of the railways.
Also I think if you were to do a plan to get Greater Cambridge up to 1 million plus people you would probably design it as a polycentric area so most people would be travelling between these centres rather than travelling in to the medieval core.
if that was the core of a metropolis those really should be turned into 4 story town houses or mansion blocks (something that would make current owners rich) doubling population density.
It has already been done. In the last 10-15 years the area around the old station has been transformed and it is now what Americans and Australians would call the Central Business District. Everything nearer than about 300 metres, and a lot that's further away, is hotels, offices and apartment blocks. I can only think of 2 remaining terraces where it is feasible to do this.
Anything that can be done can be afforded, particularly when that thing has a massive ROI which anything infrastructural around the Ox-Cam corridor will if you do it at rates that our equally rich and settled neighbours can do.
The west side of the island is rainy, the east side is dry. Cambridge is on the east side, in the driest bit of the east side. It is literally hundreds of miles away from the rainy bits.
Cambridge is also more than 50 miles from the sea.
There are 2 huge geographical differences between here and Israel. One is tides, which in Israel are effectively non-existent. The other is winter storms, of which we have already had three this month.
Then there is the cost of electricity, which would be needed to power the desalination plants, and to power the pumps to move the water uphill, because desalination plants are at sea level. All pipeline routes from the sea to Cambridge, bar one, involve pumping the water up to 100 metres above sea level or more, to get over the watershed. The exception is the Wash, where a 50 mile pipeline through the Fens would lose much of the water through leakage, because the pipe would fracture under the stresses and strains of differential expansion and contraction of the peat.
Just to be clear you can supply 1 million peoples generous daily needs from 1m diameter pipe, the power required to pump that volume of water 100m into the air would be about 2MW and would cost about £5k per day (0.5p/user day). The water inflow/outflow pipe system would be in the region of 1/100 the size of the one they needed to build at Sizewell B which also survives tides and storms. None of this is difficult engineering, the challenge only gets difficult when laws and precedents "force" you to do things a certain way and that certain way is very slowly.
Within todays laws you can already make decisions to override virtually every process, law or custom if you have reason to do so. For example said water pipe could just run on the surface, oil pipelines of that size have run thousands of miles, 50 is not particularly troubling and you could always grow a hedge around it.
That's done by countries at the early stage of economic development. The UK did it during the Industrial Revolution. It involved slum living, child and slave labour, and at the cost of many lives. That includes the thousands of navvies that died during the construction of the railways. The main reason that UK construction productivity hasn't improved is that it has got a lot safer, and that takes more people.
Virtually everything other than construction has also got much cheaper and safer in that same time period. Construction has not got cheaper because of lack of scale and lack of consistent demand. It's likely with automation and robotics construction is also going to get a lot cheaper in the very near future. Again you need national ambition and large scale plans to make this sort of thing happen, not a few small grants to start-ups and universities.
Actually there are not. There are a few within about 400 metres, but most of those are in business use either as private schools or hotels.
It has already been done. In the last 10-15 years the area around the old station has been transformed and it is now what Americans and Australians would call the Central Business District. Everything nearer than about 300 metres, and a lot that's further away, is hotels, offices and apartment blocks. I can only think of 2 remaining terraces where it is feasible to do this.
There are houses very close to the station on the other side of the tracks, it would make sense to put another exit on that side and let the area reform in a similar manner to the west.
People assume this, but when residents have been able to vote to up-zone their area they frequently do. There are plenty of estates in London where people have traded higher density for new houses in the new development and plenty of places where owners of single family homes have voted to allow themselves to add multiple stories to their buildings, because of the massive financial advantages to doing so.
Anything that can be done can be afforded, particularly when that thing has a massive ROI which anything infrastructural around the Ox-Cam corridor will if you do it at rates that our equally rich and settled neighbours can do.
You are wrong. The costs are up front and the benefits come later. That time lag has to be filled by borrowing up front and paying back later. All borrowing has a debt servicing cost through interest payments. The UK is charged much higher rates of interest than "our equally rich and settled neighbours" because the UK already has high levels of debt, and already has existing high interest payments to make that are already putting a strain on its current public finances. On top of that, the UK has a risk premium because of our recent economic policy history, and the markets knowledge that no UK parliament can bind its successors.
Taken together, all this means that there are lots of projects with a good return on investment that, nevertheless, cannot be afforded, because the debt servicing cannot be afforded.
Just to be clear you can supply 1 million peoples generous daily needs from 1m diameter pipe, the power required to pump that volume of water 100m into the air would be about 2MW and would cost about £5k per day (0.5p/user day).
I don't buy this. Please show your working, based on an assumption of 130 litres of water consumption per person per day. There are only 86400 seconds in a day. That's about 1.5 litres per 1000 people per second, or 1500 litres per second for 1 million people. And that's without adding in industrial and commercial use.
Water is heavy, as anyone who has picked up a bucketful will know. That's a lot of pumping.
There are houses very close to the station on the other side of the tracks, it would make sense to put another exit on that side and let the area reform in a similar manner to the west.
No there are not. There are houses on the east side close to the railway but none are close to the station because there are 9 lines of carriage sidings in between. There is a proposal for an east side entrance as part of the station enhancements for East West Rail, but it doesn't bring many houses closer to the station because most already have reasonably direct access to the existing station entrance via the cycle bridge at the north end of the station or the existing Hills Road bridge at the south end. Anyone who has walked either of these will know that the houses on the east side are not close to the station.
People assume this, but when residents have been able to vote to up-zone their area they frequently do. There are plenty of estates in London where people have traded higher density for new houses in the new development and plenty of places where owners of single family homes have voted to allow themselves to add multiple stories to their buildings, because of the massive financial advantages to doing so.
You clearly don't know Cambridge or its residents very well. The area around Cambridge station is very different from an estate in London. Cambridge is a very economically unequal city. What you propose may work in areas like Abbey and Arbury, though the evidence from attempts so far isn't promising. But it definitely isn't going to work near the station because your so called massive financial advantages for residents are a mirage. They have already got their financial advantage and are not going to risk losing it.
You are wrong. The costs are up front and the benefits come later. That time lag has to be filled by borrowing up front and paying back later. All borrowing has a debt servicing cost through interest payments. The UK is charged much higher rates of interest than "our equally rich and settled neighbours" because the UK already has high levels of debt, and already has existing high interest payments to make that are already putting a strain on its current public finances. On top of that, the UK has a risk premium because of our recent economic policy history, and the markets knowledge that no UK parliament can bind its successors.
Taken together, all this means that there are lots of projects with a good return on investment that, nevertheless, cannot be afforded, because the debt servicing cannot be afforded.
"Whatever can be done can be afforded" is a Keynes quote, it is fundamentally true, you just can't do everything all at once. In the longer term it is possible to get more efficient so that you can do more things with the same resources and given how crap we are at building this is a massive potential lever to pull. At the economy level it's not like we lack resources, it mainly that a long term lack of permission and lack of planning and ownership has meant that we haven't invested in both public and private sectors (which has depressed our productive capacity). We can invest on a mixture of credit, direct foreign investment and reduced consumption (mainly of foreign made goods). You get all those things by actually having a plan that looks like it will work.
There are pretty big differences to doing a substantial expansion of the Ox-Cam arc and going on a debt fuelled infrastructure binge. The key is ramp rate, if you just drop the money then all you end up doing is causing sector inflation, if you ramp up over 1-10 years you generate capability and you start turning vape shop employees or English lit grads into construction sector employees who have a lifetime of higher value work associated with them. Thus they inherently expand the economy rather than just the things they build, furthermore a lot of what they do is exportable so that benefit is long term and not just tied to UK build.
Secondly this assumes that the majority of spend would be government, the vast majority spend in the Ox-Cam arc would be private, both debt and direct foreign investment. Much of the development "wants" to happen, it just lacks permission and coordination. The bits the government needs to sort out are the overall vision, coordination, planning, transport and infrastructure, they don't need to build the homes, research labs, factories etc. See the "crowd in" effects of "Build Back Better" in the US.
I don't buy this. Please show your working, based on an assumption of 130 litres of water consumption per person per day. There are only 86400 seconds in a day. That's about 1.5 litres per 1000 people per second, or 1500 litres per second for 1 million people. And that's without adding in industrial and commercial use.
Water is heavy, as anyone who has picked up a bucketful will know. That's a lot of pumping.
You have nearly done all the maths yourself, pump 1500l at 2m/s and you end up with a 1m diameter pipe. You can then do friction calcs to work out how much it would cost to pump water down that pipe 50 miles from the wash. It would be about 2.4MW inc pump efficiency so pretty negligible in the context of giving 1 million people water. Those million people would want about 800MW of power generation anyway, even if they don't run massive data centres or similar.
We can generate electricity with negligible harmful externalities, thus we should use electricity to solve as many of our problems as possible (see transport). Desalination is faster and has lower environmental costs than building reservoirs, brine plumes on the exit can be designed so that they mix rapidly and they are about the equivalent of peeing in a reservoir in scale anyway.
Keynes operated in a very different economic environment. What may have been true then isn't necessarily true now. On a world of freely exchanged currencies and debt, the invisible hand of the free market sets what can be afforded.
I don't share your view on this. For commercial buildings we are mostly very good, though we are not so good at houses, because of distortions in the housing market. A lot of commercial buildings have gone up in and around Cambridge in the last 10-15 years, and construction usually happens at pace.
There are pretty big differences to doing a substantial expansion of the Ox-Cam arc and going on a debt fuelled infrastructure binge. The key is ramp rate, if you just drop the money then all you end up doing is causing sector inflation, if you ramp up over 1-10 years you generate capability and you start turning vape shop employees or English lit grads into construction sector employees who have a lifetime of higher value work associated with them. Thus they inherently expand the economy rather than just the things they build, furthermore a lot of what they do is exportable so that benefit is long term and not just tied to UK build.
Secondly this assumes that the majority of spend would be government, the vast majority spend in the Ox-Cam arc would be private, both debt and direct foreign investment. Much of the development "wants" to happen, it just lacks permission and coordination. The bits the government needs to sort out are the overall vision, coordination, planning, transport and infrastructure, they don't need to build the homes, research labs, factories etc.
And that's what is happening. The Greater Cambridge draft local plan looks out to 2045, and the Cambridge Growth Company look out to 2050. The infrastructure is what imposes the constraints, especially water, healthcare and transport.
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You have nearly done all the maths yourself, pump 1500l at 2m/s and you end up with a 1m diameter pipe. You can then do friction calcs to work out how much it would cost to pump water down that pipe 50 miles from the wash.
I agree that pumping water from the Wash would not be difficult, but what would be difficult pumping water from the Wash is not losing a lot of it to leakage. That's going to be an issue getting water out of the reservoir in the Fens too, though over a shorter distance. But pumping water from the Thames Estuary, for example, involves a lot of pumping uphill against gravity.
We can generate electricity with negligible harmful externalities, thus we should use electricity to solve as many of our problems as possible (see transport). Desalination is faster and has lower environmental costs than building reservoirs, brine plumes on the exit can be designed so that they mix rapidly and they are about the equivalent of peeing in a reservoir in scale anyway.
If this really is a practical proposition then the place that should be trying to do it is London. Then Cambridge could have water from, for example, Hanningfield near Chelmsford.
Meanwhile, Peter Freeman of the Cambridge Growth Company met local councillors last week, reported here on BBC:
The number is "not a daft figure" but could include parts of Bedfordshire and Suffolk, an official says.
www.bbc.co.uk
The plan for 150,000 new homes in Greater Cambridge was "probably not a daft figure" but could include parts of other counties, a senior official has said.
The government wants the homes built by 2050 and Chancellor Rachel Reeves says the Oxford-Cambridge growth corridor has "the potential to be Europe's Silicon Valley".
But when asked at a South Cambridgeshire District Council meeting about the 150,000 figure, Peter Freeman, the chairman of the Cambridge Growth Company, said the area may include Tempsford, 22 miles away in Bedfordshire, and Haverhill, 17 miles away in Suffolk.
The government said it was taking "decisive action" to build more homes in Cambridge.
Freeman told councillors a challenge he had not expected was "that there are considerable wards definitely in the city and in some of the villages which are significantly disadvantaged".
"So any growth that we propose must be for the benefit of the communities as a whole. It's not just about international post-docs, it's not just about life sciences or AI, it's about a sustainable city."
He continued: "If the city doesn't work for everybody in the end it won't be able to attract the talent.
"So if the government wants economic growth here, we've also got to have social justice, we've got to sort transport, we've got to sort water."
But what Freeman's comments show is that the Growth Company/Development Corporation needs to understand the local issues, which can't be done over all of the corridor by one body.
A local development corporation is now broadly accepted as the way forward, working in collaboration with the local authority. Peterborough now wants a development corporation too see here:
Leaders say the body could bring pace and long-term certainty to regeneration in the city.
www.bbc.co.uk
Leaders called for a new corporation to be set up to help boost the transformation of Peterborough city centre.
Cambridgeshire Mayor Paul Bristow, Peterborough MP Andrew Pakes, and city council leader Shabina Qayyum wrote a joint letter to the government, asking for a mayoral development corporation to be established.
The leaders said the new body could bring a greater pace and long-term certainty to regeneration, housing delivery, and job creation.
This consultation is published by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and seeks views on establishing a new development corporation in Greater Cambridge, to be known as the Greater Cambridge Development Corporation (“the Development Corporation”).
If taken forward, the government would establish the Greater Cambridge Development Corporation, a centrally-led urban development corporation, to focus on delivering strategic development in Greater Cambridge.
It would be guided by a commitment to sustainable growth, delivering high quality placemaking that protects and enhances Greater Cambridge’s distinctive character, heritage and natural environment, and creating beautiful, well-designed places where people want to live, work, study and visit. To do so, it would look to have the following overarching objectives:
1. Transformational economic growth
Drive a step change in the sustainable and inclusive economic development of Cambridge, commensurate with its status as a critical national growth area. Deliver a significant increase in high quality jobs and homes, cement Greater Cambridge’s status as a global centre for science, technology, and innovation.
2. Infrastructure-led development
Coordinate and advance the delivery of a radical upgrade to infrastructure in Cambridge, removing systemic barriers to growth and setting new benchmarks for connectivity and sustainability. Building on ongoing work to identify Mass Rapid Transit solutions for the region, introduce transformative transport solutions that minimise journey times, reduce congestion, and enable seamless movement across Greater Cambridge.
3. Innovative investment
Establish Greater Cambridge as the UK’s flagship for integrated investment into infrastructure and housing, unlocking significant public and private capital. Front-load infrastructure funding to accelerate delivery of well-planned, sustainable communities that go beyond current and draft local plan ambitions. Drawing on the government’s track record for attracting private investment at 5 times the level of public funding, this investment would support delivery at major strategic locations.
4. Environment and climate
Deliver environmentally sustainable and climate resilient outcomes through creating and maintaining large, connected, high-quality green and blue spaces, and long-term stewardship of natural assets.
5. Inclusion and opportunity
Reduce inequality between people and places in Greater Cambridge, maintaining a high rate of affordable housing delivery. Establishing a progressive skills and talent agenda that links local communities to the growing opportunities across the innovation ecosystem, and so reduces unemployment in all age categories.
The proposed boundary of the Development Corporation aligns with the current, combined administrative areas of Cambridge City Council and South Cambridgeshire District Council
Development corporations can make planning and policy decisions for a local authority area, like councils.
www.bbc.co.uk
Residents of Greater Cambridge are being asked for their views on a planned government-led corporation aimed at speeding up development in the area.
The corridor between the city and Oxford has been termed as having the "potential to be Europe's Silicon Valley" by the chancellor, and about 150,000 homes have been planned for in and around Cambridge.
People are now being asked for their views on whether a development corporation should be established and the powers it would have to approve new houses.
Housing and Planning Minister Matthew Pennycook said it would "provide us with the necessary powers, authority and access to finance to unleash ambitious and high-quality sustainable growth".
According to the government, development corporations may have powers to create development policies, and make planning decisions for a local authority area - something which usually sits with councils.
This statutory consultation seeks views on the proposals that the Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) has received following the Secretary of State’s invitation to councils in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough to submit proposals for unitary local government for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough.
The 4 proposals in this consultation were made by the following councils on 28 November 2025:
Cambridge City Council, East Cambridgeshire District Council and South Cambridgeshire District Council proposed 2 unitary councils. These would comprise the district areas of:
North Cambridgeshire and Peterborough: Peterborough, Huntingdonshire, East Cambridgeshire, Fenland
Greater Cambridge: Cambridge, South Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire County Council proposed 2 unitary councils. These would comprise the district areas of:
North West: Peterborough, Fenland, Huntingdonshire
South East: Cambridge, East Cambridgeshire, South Cambridgeshire
Huntingdonshire District Council proposed 3 unitary councils. These would comprise the district areas of:
North East: Peterborough, Fenland, East Cambridgeshire
Central Huntingdonshire: Huntingdonshire
South West: Cambridge, South Cambridgeshire
Peterborough City Council and Fenland District Council proposed 3 unitary councils. This includes a request to split existing district council areas between the proposed new councils. These would comprise the district areas of:
Greater Peterborough: Peterborough and 9 wards from Huntingdonshire
Mid Cambridgeshire: Fenland, East Cambridgeshire and 17 wards from Huntingdonshire
Greater Cambridge: Cambridge, South Cambridgeshire
This consultation asks questions about each proposal to help inform the assessment of the proposals.
People in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough can give their views on the unitary authority suggestions.
www.bbc.co.uk
The government has confirmed it is considering four options for reorganising councils in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough.
The government said unitary authorities – which would provide all local services currently provided by county, city and district councils – must be created to replace the current two-tier system in the region.
I haven't been able to find various key details, including the area it will cover and what planning powers it will take from local authorities.
BBC News has a report here:
A new "Greater Cambridge" regeneration body will ensure transport links and community services are "built alongside new homes, not as an afterthought", according to the government.
Ministers confirmed a development corporation will be set up to deliver thousands of new homes and infrastructure across Cambridge city and South Cambridgeshire.
They said the Greater Cambridge Development Corporation would have the "powers and certainty to deliver infrastructure-first growth at scale".
Homes England, with its National Housing Bank, and The Hill Group have today completed the acquisition of Cambridge East, a strategic site that will support the delivery of more than 10,000 new homes, thousands of jobs and a thriving new community.
www.gov.uk
Homes England, with its National Housing Bank, and The Hill Group have today completed the acquisition of Cambridge East, a strategic site that will support the delivery of more than 10,000 new homes, thousands of jobs and a thriving new community.
The development is expected to benefit from the proposed Cambridge East station. Subject to planning consent and the provision of funding, the station could improve connectivity to central Cambridge and London, as well as extending onwards to Bedford and Oxford – strengthening links within the Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor.
Cambridge East scheme will be "one of the UK's largest urban extension projects", Homes England says.
www.bbc.co.uk
More than 10,000 homes and a new railway station could be built as part of the redevelopment of a city airport after land was purchased.
Homes England and The Hill Group announced on Wednesday that it had bought Cambridge Airport and surrounding land from the Marshall Group, to deliver thousands of new homes and create about 9,000 jobs.
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) consulted on the proposal to establish a centrally-led urban development corporation in Greater Cambridge, to be known as the Greater Cambridge Development Corporation (“the Development Corporation”).
The government recognises the varied responses on the Development Corporation’s boundary, and remains of the view that the boundary should align with the current, combined administrative areas of Cambridge City Council and South Cambridgeshire District Council.
However, there is an interesting addition here which may be of particular reference to transport infrastructure:
Although the Development Corporation will predominantly focus on its designated development area, it will also have influence beyond its formal boundary, providing it is in keeping with its objective to regenerate the area within the boundary. This includes the ability to acquire land (including compulsorily) outside its development area to enable it to discharge its functions within its boundary.
On planning it is difficult to find a suitable quote to summarise what is being proposed, but I have found this:
Defining strategic sites
The government agrees with respondents that development size is not always the best determinant of ‘strategic development’. That is why the government consulted on the Development Corporation being granted the power to act as the local planning authority for strategic sites and any site that may prejudice the delivery of a site of strategic importance. The government intends to provide a definition of ‘sites of strategic importance’ at a later date, which will provide certainty on which development falls under the Development Corporation’s remit to determine.
Prior to the point we define strategic sites, the Development Corporation will use minimum thresholds as a proxy to provide a clear and proportionate mechanism to focus the Development Corporation’s resources on sites of strategic importance, providing certainty about development management responsibilities to applicants and residents.
During a speech announcing the plans, Hill Group chief executive Andy Hill added: "Cambridge East is a unique opportunity to create a thriving, sustainable new neighbourhood.
"We are open to all ideas - we want to make this the destination people come to when they visit Cambridge, as well as the historic city."
The Cambridge Growth Company, a subsidiary of Homes England, would work in collaboration with The Hill Group to deliver the project.
What are some of the ideas?
Image caption,
Andy Hill said some plans explored could be turning the hangars on the airport's site into venues
Hill said one of the key aspects to the project was transport.
"Our vision is a new station at the south of the site, to relocate the park-and-ride to the north of the site, move it further out and make it substantially bigger - and then link the two by some form of automated transport or light rail," he said.
The development is expected to benefit from the proposed Cambridge East station. Subject to planning consent and the provision of funding, the station could improve connectivity to central Cambridge and London, as well as extending onwards to Bedford and Oxford – strengthening links within the Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor.
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