[Members] Cambridge Market Closure & Petition; Market Square Redevelopment; Spaces & Movt plans at Transport & Planning Cttee; Visitor Growth Scheme

[Wendy Blythe]

Dear all,

*Happy New Year!*

Yet again it starts with a bang.

*Cambridge Market Closure and Petition*

There has been considerable protest against the City Council’s decision to
close Cambridge Market.

The closure applies to fresh-food stalls such as greengrocers and
fishmongers, which remained open in the first lockdown. Buyers for food
must now go inside shops despite greater risks of infection inside
buildings than in the open air. This snap decision has made the nationals.
Rowan Pelling’s Saturday column for the *Daily Telegrap*h covered it and
the concerns of Dame Mary Beard. See link below.



http://digitaleditions.telegraph.co.uk/data/466/reader/reader.html?social#!preferred/0/package/466/pub/466/page/70/article/119040

Others who have commented on social media include:

*Peter Studdert, former Director of Cambridge City Council Planning*

Very poor decision. The fresh food stalls in the market kept us supplied
all through the year, including the first lockdown. Supermarkets are much
more dangerous. Close the takeaways if they are the problem, but please
leave the fresh food stalls.

*Phil Rodgers, blogger*

The Government's Tier 4 rules specifically say that food retailers
operating from a market stall are permitted to remain open. @camcitco
should not be cutting off stallholders livelihoods and forcing shoppers
indoors with no basis in the Tier 4 rules. https://gov.uk/government/pub



*Ben Turner Cambridge Live reporter*

After the controversial shutdown of Cambridge's popular market, traders in
other parts of the county are open for business this morning
cambridge-news.co.uk/news/local-new… <https://t.co/Q7OuEIk1xV>



*Emerald Foods market trader*

Can’t bear to think about the fact that as of today we have zero money
coming in, bitterly disappointed customers, a new van to pay for and
knowing that people will be in town eating fast food and drinking coffee
when we should be selling essential food!!!!!!

This petition is circulating

http://chng.it/wYHSspfDSw

*Market Square Redevelopment*

There is a lot of concern that the Market closure which may put established
traders out of business is also to facilitate development plans for the
city centre and central conservation areas on which the council have been
working on for over two years with the Greater Cambridge Partnership,
Greater Cambridge Shared Planning Service and transport groups such as
GCP’s Non Motorised Users Group (CamCycle are a member), GCP’s Landscape,
Heritage and Ecology group and Cambridge Bid. LHE and NMU working groups
have devised GCP's Working Group Design principles to adopt on all GCP
transport schemes. Link below for the Market Square redevelopment plans.



*A re-evaluation of Market Square can lead to it meeting its full potential
as a key civic space and the heart of the city centre.
<https://t.co/B3C55oPqSv?amp=1>*

Cambridge Architecture Autumn/Winter 2020 Issue reports that the Market
Square is seen as a corporate priority for Cambridge’s economic recovery
post Covid. See p 5. L

https://issuu.com/ribacaa/docs/ca80/4

See previous FeCRA responses posted concerning the Market

http://www.fecra.org.uk/the-market-square/

https://www.fecra.org.uk/20th-march-city-centre-plans-fecra-response/

*Cambridge City Council Transport and Planning Scrutiny Committee*

*Tues 12th Jan, 2021 at 5.30
**https://democracy.cambridge.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=475&MID=3791#AI2543
<https://democracy.cambridge.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=475&MID=3791#AI2543>*

Committee members
*https://democracy.cambridge.gov.uk/mgMeetingAttendance.aspx?ID=3791
<https://democracy.cambridge.gov.uk/mgMeetingAttendance.aspx?ID=3791>*

On 12 January the Planning and Transport Committee meets to approve a high
level strategic document which Stephen Kelly, Greater Cambridge Shared
Planning Service Director says will not be a Supplementary Planning
Document as originally planned but which will determine spaces and movement
plans for the city centre and transport and planning decisions about the
market square and central conservation areas. These urban spaces include
green spaces such as The Backs, Queen’s Green and Lammas Land [i] <#_edn1>.
This ‘higher level document’ will bypass the planning process and there are
concerns that it won’t be subject to the same constraints. [ii] <#_edn2>



Glenys Self who represents the Cambridge Market Traders Association and
Friends of Cambridge Market support group has expressed concerns to
councillors and city leaders about the direction of plans for the market,
and the impact on the rights of the traders who have traded on the square
since the time of King Edgar (956).



https://www.fecra.org.uk/docs/Letter%20to%20CEO%20Cambridge%20City%20Market%20Matters.pdf

Others have documented the privatisation of public space as cash-strapped
councils look for ways to monetise their assets. See the website of
journalist Anna Minton and her book *Ground Control. *

https://www.annaminton.com/groundcontrol

The project for the market square has morphed from its original scope. The
original brief was for a Spaces and Movement SPD and for this to include a
new Streetscape Manual which would be applied to the market square. The
contract for that with BDP was with Cambridgeshire County Council and the
Greater Cambridge Partnership with Cambridge City Council ( Greater
Cambridge Shared Planning Service) as the delivery agent.

*Combined Authority Growth Project funding for a Cambridge Visitor Scheme*

On 27 Nov the Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority Board
attended by City Council Leader Lewis Herbert approved funding for a
Cambridge Visitor Growth Scheme Project based on 'scoring criteria and
external evaluator' see link below.


https://democracy.cambridge.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=475&MID=3791#AI25436



See p 130 of extracts from Natural Cambridgeshire's Scoping Nature for
investment plan[iii] <#_edn3>
https://www.fecra.org.uk/docs/Extracts%20from%20Natural%20Cambs%20Scoping%20Nature%20for%20Investment.pdf

Many residents across the political spectrum are saying they want to be
able to shop locally and safely outside at the market and buy healthy,
fresh food and support local producers and suppliers. They would like
Cambridge Market and its established traders to be a key element of
sustainable growth and visitor schemes for this area.

Responding to concerns about the market closure the Executive Councillor
for the City Centre and the Environment Councillor Rosy Moore has said the
closure is under review. Many residents ask how growth planned for the
market and city centre can be decided until after the pandemic is under
control. They also point to the impact that increased visitor footfall
during Covid is already having on Cambridge’s fragile urban green spaces.


*What can you do?*

If you share any of the concerns above and want to support the market and
its established traders in the first instance we suggest you sign the
petition (link below) requesting the council to reopen the market for
essential food supplies and that you write to your local councillors copied
to Exec Cllrs Rosy Moore, Katie Thornburrow and Cambridge MPs Daniel
Zeichner and Anthony Browne.

http://chng.it/wYHSspfDSw

rosy.moore at cambridge.gov.uk

katie.thornburrow at cambridge.gov <katie.thornburrow at cambridge.gov.uk>

daniel at danielzeichner.co.uk

anthony.browne.mp at parliament.uk





Best wishes,

Wendy



------------------------------

[i] <#_ednref1>
https://democracy.cambridge.gov.uk/documents/s54436/MSFP%20Report.pdf


'4.2 Since these original aims were defined, the COVID pandemic has brought
into sharp focus the need to achieve a shared ‘buy in’ to a vision for the
city centre. The process in preparing a supplementary planning document is
not agile enough to respond to changing demands and priorities, so an
overall higher-level document is needed to guide and inform decision
makers. The role of Making Space for People has therefore changed in
response to this need'


[ii] <#_ednref2> The Town and Country Planning (Local Planning) (England)
Regulations 2012 require a local planning authority to consult the public
and stakeholders before adopting a Supplementary Planning Document (SPD).
Regulation 12(a) requires a statement to be prepared setting out who has
been consulted while preparing the SPD; a summary of the main issues
raised; and how these issues have been addressed in the SPD.



[iii] <#_ednref3> From
https://www.fecra.org.uk/docs/Extracts%20from%20Natural%20Cambs%20Scoping%20Nature%20for%20Investment.pdf

‘the CFPA team are working with Vivid Economics (a strategic economics
consultancy) to develop a natural capital assessment to value the public
open spaces in Cambridgeshire. They are also working with Jon Sheaff &
Associates (a multi-disciplinary practice specialising in the design and
management of public spaces) to develop a set of typologies for public open
spaces and map them. Collectively this work will allow the CFPA team to
identify, classify and value the publicly owned, or managed, parks and
green spaces within the county’…‘By including publicly owned green and open
spaces, the DNIP would be able to offer multiple benefits to potential
investors, for example access to nature, health and wellbeing. These
additional benefits could prove attractive to potential public or private
sector investors’.


Wendy Blythe
Chair, FeCRA

www.fecra.org.uk
www.facebook.com/CambridgeRAs
www.twitter.com/fecra2
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