Fight to save commons goes on

15 January 2007

The fight to save the commons of east Cambridge from being ploughed up for bus roads will be taken to a full meeting of the City Council next month.

Abbey councillor John Durrant, who chairs the council's east committee, said he was hoping to change the council's mind on the controversial proposals to drive the roads across Coldham's Common and Ditton Meadows, behind the ancient Leper Chapel.

Coun Durrant, Labour's transport and planning spokesman, announced the move today (Sun, Jan 14) after another council committee last week voted to back the option, contained in the recently published Cambridge East Sustainable Transport Strategy, on the casting vote of its chairman.

He accused leading Liberal Democrat members of the environment scrutiny committee of 'snubbing' local councillors on his own committee who last month voted unanimously to reject the proposals.

'We still have all to play for – the ruling group is split on the issue and we have support among them, as was shown by the vote on the east committee, which has four Liberal Democrat members.'

Coun Durrant, a founder of the Save Our Commons and Meadows (SOCAM) campaign which successfully opposed earlier county council plans to put a road across Ditton Meadows, said he was extremely disappointed with the scrutiny committee. 'Despite the east committee's clear stand, they backed Councillor Sian Reid, executive councillor for planning and transport, in welcoming the bus road proposals and turning down my own motion to reject them.

'I am saddened at the sight of the city's environment 'champion' supporting these destructive proposals, which would ruin some of the most unspoilt areas of the city,' he added.

Coun Durrant said it was not a party political issue. 'Some Liberal Democrats have already supported the Labour position, and we are hoping the council will back us and persuade her to change her mind.'

He said he would work to set up SOCAM again to resume campaigning if his group lost the vote on February 22.

The bus road proposals are contained in the consultants' report for the City Council as part of plans to cut congestion from proposed development on the site of Marshall's Airport and on land north of Newmarket Road. But Coun Durrant said because no new roads were planned, Newmarket Road and Coldham's Lane, already among the most congested in the city, looked set for gridlock.

'Some 11,500 homes are planned for the airport site, which will mean another 125,000 trips a day in and out of the city. It would be an absolute nightmare.'