 Good evening everyone and welcome to greater Cambridge shared planning and action plan panel session and I think this is our last panel session or the support in the 10 week consultation to the Northeast Cambridge Air Action Plan. So the generic session tonight sort of a wrap up of issues and got a panel here for you to answer questions for those of you might have been to previous sessions about an hour and we're going to run through a quick presentation. And then we'll leave some time for questions at the end anything we don't manage to get answered today. We'll get up on the website and we'll set you the links at the end as well. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to introduce panel first, and then we're going to cover this housekeeping to let you know how to proceed with questions and answers. And then we'll just start the session so let me just quickly go around the screen as it is now around the table so I'm going to go to my left first and to Hannah. My name is Hannah Loftus. I'm a special project officer at the shared planning service and I've been leading on the public engagement community engagement and communication side of the AP and also the local plan. Thank you. Matt. Good evening everyone. I'm Matthew Patterson. I'm one of the project leads on developing the air action plan for Northeast Cambridge working for the shared planning service. So, cheers Matt Terry. Good evening everyone, I'm Terry DeSousa, a principal planning policy officer at the great Cambridge shared planning service and I was one of the team that's been involved in preparing the action plan, and also the evidence based documents to underneath. We've got Joe down the bottom here who's helping run the session tonight. She's leading on all the tech wizardry that's hopefully going to be forthcoming. And so I've been introduced myself. My name is Paul Prada. I'm Assistant Director for Strassian Economy in the Great Cambridge Shared Planning Service. So just to let you know, the session is being recorded tonight. So you will be able to view it. It will be both on the SCDC website and the Cambridge City website in the following days. You can ask some questions. There's a little Q&A box down the bottom. No chat function, but if you stick your questions in there, we'll answer them in the panel session at the end. You can do that anonymously or you can choose to leave the name. And for now, I think we'll just get on with the session. So I'm going to hand it to Hannah and she's going to start the presentation. For all she's on mute. Sorry, I'm just sharing my screen. And I'm just going to run through a few of the headline aspects of the AAP. And as a prelude to really everyone asking some questions, hopefully this is going to come up. So just a little bit about the Area Action Plan. For those of you who may be not as familiar with some of the sort of back story here, really, why we're doing this consultation and what the big ideas are. It is a very significant part of Cambridge and the area in terms of one of the major brownfield sites that we still have that's incredibly accessible to the city centre. It's a 15 minute cycle ride at the minute. It already has Cambridge North Station and the guided busway and many other links. And all of that is only going to get better over the coming years. So it really is a strategically important site with this range of landowners that we're trying to coordinate through a planning framework. But it is also adjacent to some of the communities that have some of the biggest challenges in our area. And I think it is key for us as planners that the plan we put in place addresses some of those questions of deprivation and integration and really benefits those local communities in terms of housing, jobs and local services. For those of you who aren't as familiar as others with what an Area Action Plan actually is. So it's a planning framework. It's actually a pretty important form of planning framework. It's basically equivalent in status to a local plan. It sets out a spatial framework. So that is what goes where and the set of thematic policies as well. So how that stuff should be designed. What are the kind of key criteria that we will be asking developments that come forward to comply with and so forth. It will be supported by a very extensive evidence base. And a lot of that is already on our website that you can read. It supports this draft plan and that will be further developed over the coming months and years indeed. Because it's a high level development plan document, it goes through a rigorous examination process with an independent planning inspector. So again, very similar to what a local plan would go through. And that's one of the reasons why it needs all of this evidence base and so forth. Because we really need to show that it's as well founded as it possibly could be on what the areas needs are and what is most sustainable and suitable. Just a little bit about how we got to this point. There have been various consultations over the years on the site, including two issues and options, consultations and actual fact. We've also worked very closely with community representatives, the local elected ward members, as well as our executive members. And of course, as many people will know, one of the key drivers here is that Central Government's Housing Infrastructure Fund has now confirmed that it would fund the relocation of the waste water treatment plant. And that really is one of the major catalysts for significant change and regeneration in this area. And that is because of the opportunity here to create new homes and jobs in a very sustainable location. So we've been consulting on this vision over the last sort of eight weeks, got a few more weeks to go. And it's the vision that we've developed alongside all of those partners over the last couple of years. It is very much about what a 21st century low-carbon city district should be like, what the mix of uses should be, how inclusive it should be for our communities, and the sustainable transport, the walkable, cyclical neighborhood very much at its heart. A few headline figures of how that breaks down in terms of the numbers. At the moment, there are 15,000 jobs in the AAP area, but only three homes. So a key driver has been to rebalance and create more homes accessible to those jobs where people don't have to commute long distances but can walk, cycle, get bus, to work themselves. So around 8,000 homes are what are proposed in the draft area action plan. Again, these are our consultation proposals and we're hearing lots of comments about these at the moment. 40% of them is our target for affordable housing out of those 8,000 homes. We're also looking at intensifying workspace. So some of the business parks and science parks we feel can be intensified and we're also looking at consolidating the industrial uses on the site, as well as creating really significant public amenities. Some major public parks and squares, schools, library community facilities, and the all-important connectivity that will knit northeast Cambridge into its surroundings as seamlessly as it possibly can. Some of the key themes, really, it is not just about supporting the tech and the R&D sectors, even though obviously the Science Park and St. John's and so forth are within the AAP boundary. We are retaining the same amount of industrial space as is currently on the site but in a more effective and consolidated form. This goes further in terms of the range of businesses that we want to cite themselves in northeast Cambridge. It's not just about the large firms, it's also about start-up service industries and all sorts of other sorts of business. And that goes across to the housing as well. It is different sorts of housing for different kinds of people. Council and social rented, shared ownership, key worker, built to rent. Also, they're talking about local employers' housing in terms of partnering with some of those employers so that they can actually offer homes to their employees locally to themselves. Self-finished as well as, of course, conventional market sale. So it really is about a mix of users, a mix of people and a mix of kinds of lifestyles that are enabled by development. The other really key cross-cutting theme is about walking and cycling first. The car will not be king in northeast Cambridge. And I think this is a radical departure from many of the sort of norms, if you like, of development across the country, in fact, over the last 60, 70 years. It is about putting walking and cycling and public transport first as a natural and obvious choice, discouraging non-essential car use. We will, it's not about banning cars. It's saying, yes, you can use a car, you can get a delivery if you need it, but to reduce as much as possible your need for that. And really, that is about air quality and well-being for everybody. It's not just about the climate change agenda. Of course, that's incredibly important, but it is also on a community level the right thing to do for everybody that's affected by air pollution and the lack of good walking and cycling connections in the area. What goes where? So there will be four centres of activity, four local centres of different sorts, a district centre in the middle of the site, which will be the main hub for library, arts, health shops and so forth. A local centre down by Cambridge North Station, which will supplement what's already happening there in terms of the hotel and so forth with local shops and other services. A neighbourhood centre up near St John's Business Park, and that is very much about serving the new residential areas that are planned for near there, with school, local shops and so forth. And then also a local centre really on the edge of the AAP area, near to King's Hedges, on the edge of the Science Park, and that is about saying actually we can bring local communities together with the Science Park workers, with Cambridge Regional College, serve them all with some of the things that they really need in the area and kind of start to knit those communities together really effectively. More about that knitting in, these just show some of the key connectivity routes around the area that we're consulting on. So they're quite significant because they will really start to mitigate and overcome some of the existing barriers to movement, particularly the guided busway, Milton Road itself of course, the A14 and also the railway line in terms of access to the green space and the cycle path along the River Cam itself. And it is designed that the wider public transport improvements in mind, so Cambridge Autonomous Metro and so forth, we are looking at leaving space for that. And again, we are really interested to hear everybody's views on are these the right connections? Should we be doing more? Have we missed something? How can this be most effectively integrated with our existing communities? And some of the green spaces that are being planned for, there's a really significant amount of green space, not only the kind of over 10 hectares of what we would call strategic green spaces, but also the mature landscapes that already exist in the Science Park and other areas, which is nearly nine hectares. Those are all going to be retained and improved. And also neighborhood spaces, which aren't shown on this diagram because they are the smaller, kind of more localized spaces where you're going to have little pocket parks, local play spaces, and of course the streets themselves designed as places for informal socializing, recreation and other activities. So it is a comprehensive green network which aims to link up Milton Country Park right down to Northfield Road and the guided busway inter-tested in Venn, providing those green links all the way through to the Science Park along the first public drain as well. And addressing climate change, a really key overarching theme here and being very ambitious about what that actually means. We know we have the net zero carbon challenge by 2050. This is about saying, well, how does that shake down into real policies within the plan? So ambitious targets for non-residential buildings in terms of the Bream standard. That's the sort of environmental standard that is kind of best practice really in the country. How do we incorporate biodiversity net gain? How do we make our buildings as naturally and passively without using lots of environment energy for air conditioning and so forth passively cooled? So things like shading, thermal mass, all of the kind of passive design features and of course water as well. We want to be as ambitious as we can be. We are limited at the moment by what we can do from government regulations as well but we're really trying to push that and we'll be addressing that further as things hopefully change over the next few years as well at national level. So just a couple of notes on what happens next. We are coming towards the end of consultation which closes on the 5th of October. So for those of you listening, please, please do get your consultation responses in before the 5th of October. We really, we've had lots in already. We want to have as many as we can and we want to hear from as many diverse voices as possible as well. We really, really want to hear from younger people and other people in the surrounding areas because it is about young people above all as well. We will then be undertaking some more evidence gathering and some more stakeholder engagement as we review all of those responses and we will be reporting on how we take those responses into account at the next part of the plan making stage which is what we call the pre-submission plan. So we will be reflecting on the responses that we receive. We will be making changes to the plan as a result of those adapting it if necessary and then we will be submitting that to members for their regulatory approval of the pre-submission plan in autumn 21. There is then a bit of a hiatus whilst the relocation process for the wastewater treatment plant goes through what's known as a development consent order, DCO process. So there's a little bit of a kind of pause there before we then go into public consultation on the proposed submission plan which is likely at the current timings to be in winter 2023. Following that there will be examination and adoption of the plan and we welcome any questions that you have on that process going forward. So we thought we would just kick things off with a few questions that have been recently asked on social media and across other platforms that we know people are talking about in communities and wanting some answers to. So the first one is coming about because we've had the Anglian water consultation on their relocation which closed a couple of weeks ago and one of the questions that people have been asking is how did we actually decide to develop this site rather than any other site? What is the back story here behind deciding to move Anglian waters plant and release essentially this site for development? So I'm going to hand over to Terry who's going to answer on this question before we move on. Thank you Hannah. So essentially the work on the area action plan has been ongoing for quite some time now. So for those of you that can remember we originally consulted on this area in 2014 and that was an early issues and options document where we asked a whole range of questions about what could we do around the wastewater treatment works if we were to develop this area? So at the time there was no funding in place there was no kind of ability the wastewater treatment would actually be moving so it was about what could you do around the periphery of that site and it was purely around the land to the east of Milton Road so it was between the railway line and Milton Road and there were a few options in there in terms of could you put in more office floor space could you put in more industrial but residential was really limited to the real southern part of the site especially around Nuffield Road purely because of the odour and things like that that come from the sewage treatment works. So there was a few options that went out there and then obviously we went out for consultation and the council took all of those reps on board as we started to think about what next for the site. Now before we then went to consultation again in 2019 there were a few things that actually happened on the ground so the Cambridge North train station was built the extension to the guided busway which then served the train station was also put in place there's suddenly things started to happen in the area which improved the site's connectivity to the wider area and then last year between February and March we went out for consultation on issues and options too now that looked at a much more comprehensive development of the area so that was not only land to the eastern Milton Road but it also included the waste water treatment works if that was to go and also Cambridge Science Park as well and that was to really try and bring in you know the development aspirations at the Science Park and actually how we can try and link all of the development together and particularly think about transport and the trip budget and that kind of thing in a much more comprehensive way rather than just thinking about it as one side of Milton Road compared to the other side of Milton Road whilst we're actually out for consultation on the issues and options in 2019 the government announced that the HIF funding, the Housing Infrastructure Fund for the waste water treatment works had been successful in that first tranche of funding and so that kind of gave the council kind of further encouragement to continue with the consultation that we were undertaking and to further the plan so that kind of brings us to where we are now so you know where we are now is we are consulting on the draft plan so rather than issues and options that you know is a whole series of questions and you know what are the potential options the draft plan now sets out what we think is the most appropriate use of the site and how we can best redevelop the area and really optimise the area as much as possible if the DCO process that Hannah was talking about a moment ago is successful and the waste water treatment plan is relocated elsewhere then essentially what we need to make sure is that there is a planning framework in place otherwise there is a real risk that development in this area will just happen in a real piecemeal way you won't deliver the infrastructure that is necessary and it will be well it just won't be delivered in the way that it could be and it really won't optimise the benefits of this area so really what we're trying to do is make sure there is that framework in place now obviously if the DCO process isn't successful for whatever reason and it doesn't happen well the government decide that they're no longer going to do the funding and obviously we as accounts will need to revisit the area action plan but at the moment you know everything is you know we're working towards that's going to be successful there's also a couple of other things as well is that we've also got some infrastructure improvements that are coming in so the CAM, the Chisholm Trail the Milton Road Cycling Project as well as the Water Beach Broomway so again as I've mentioned in previous webinars this is really about northeast Cambridge integrating with the local area and actually being that missing piece of the jigsaw with a number of these different projects that are happening elsewhere and trying to bring everything together hopefully that answers the question Hannah thank you very much Brilliant another thing we have been hearing a lot of people asking about is the green space strategy here and there's been some talk about are there enough green spaces being planned for what kind are there why aren't they bigger or you know what's going on with the sort of number side of things and I'm afraid we're probably going to be back to Terry because Terry's definitely a nice bit on this stuff but Terry I wonder if you just unpack a little bit more I sort of gave a few headline figures earlier but talk a little bit more about why the strategy is the way it is Sure yeah okay I'm not sure I'm the expert but I'll try so there were basically four levels of open space if you think about it like that so first of all you have the strategic open space and these are these are the green spaces that were shown on the diagram that Hannah showed in the presentation so that's the linear part that stretches all the way from Nuffield Road all the way through the site under and under the A14 into Milton Country Park to give you a kind of a sense of scale that's about a kilometer in length from the bottom of the site to the top of the site it also picks up things like the Green High Street and the Cowley Road Triangle which is another green space that we're proposing you've also got some of the existing open spaces on the site as well so if you think about Cambridge Science Park they have an incredible landscape that runs through the middle of that site most people wouldn't really know it unless you actually work there because you know the site is very difficult to penetrate at the moment but it is you know part of that open space network that we really want to try and build on the existing and then try and get that to integrate with any new development that comes forward you then have the next level of open space down which is the kind of the neighborhood spaces now the neighborhood spaces aren't shown on any of the diagrams but it's effectively within each of the development blocks within northeast Cambridge that we're showing on our plans a planning application would come forward for those areas and those applications would need to provide not only buildings but public realm so the kind of the streets and also the green spaces that would be within those so those are the kind of neighborhood spaces that are kind of your think about your door your doorstep green spaces so you know those are the ones that are kind of normally five minutes from your front door and they provide you know kind of space for people to sit relax and space for you know young children to you know go on a swing or you know burn off some energy and then you've got the communal spaces now the communal spaces are those that are private to residents but they would be kind of ground floor kind of internal courtyards podium terraces or even roof terraces as well so you know they can provide again amenity to people on their doorsteps but again not shown on any of the plans because we're not developing the planning applications itself we're just setting a high level framework and then really importantly you have the private spaces now for the majority of new homes in northeast Cambridge they will be flatter developments and so we would be expecting balconies on on those properties and we've set standards actually about in terms of the sizes that they should be because what you get with a lot of new development where there aren't standards you end up getting balconies that are really weird shapes they're all they're really undersized and they're not even big enough for a table and chair and somebody to walk around them so we're making sure that we're providing that that sort of level of rigour within the plan in terms of the standards one of the other things that is really hard to get across but I think Hannah's money Hannah and the team managed to quite well in some of the diagrams is that we need to kind of reimagine what the streets would be because in terms of the distance the space between buildings you know as Hannah said this isn't going to be a place where you're going to be able to park your car outside your front door cars are going to be apart from disabled parking and access cars will be parked off-site in a in a car barn away from your front door so the street there's so much more opportunity within the street for kind of immunity space informal play for people to socialize and interact with each other and so we need to try and reimagine what streets kind of once were before cars sort of overtook and sort of dominated all of our streets so that's something that we're really really trying to do in in northeast Cambridge and you know this is this happens in in bedside down in south London and it's really popular on the continent as well so it can be done at this scale so you know we're just trying to apply it to a local context and then the final thing that we're trying to do is make sure that we increase access to green spaces elsewhere so you know an underpass into Milton Country Park a bridge over into Chestnut Fenn and the River Corridor so this isn't just about improving accessibility to people that live we will live within a new development but it's also people that live in the surrounding areas as well talking to somebody at Nunsway Pavilion a couple of weeks ago saying wouldn't it be great if I could go from Nunsway Pavilion through the area action plan area into Milton Country Park without having to go on a main road so like well that would actually be possible if the area action plan is built out the way that we're hoping it will be so that's one of the things that we were trying to do as well to try and get you ahead of some of the images of kind of what this might look like if you have a look at the typology study which is online we can share the link to that but also we did a webinar a few weeks ago on biodiversity and open space and there's some really good images some precedent examples from other places within the presentation of that it's kind of the first 10, 15 minutes into that so I would highly recommend looking at that if you're interested in this topic area. Thanks Terry. And another thing that a lot of people have been asking us is about COVID-19 and how this plan responds to some of the things that have become more important to people over the last few months and I think it's a really good question and it's a really interesting one that I think plan is all over the country and indeed all over Europe and really you know the whole world are asking ourselves at the moment. Matt do you want to just pick up on this a little bit? Yeah certainly and when we started drafting this plan obviously it was in much different circumstances we weren't dealing with a global pandemic at that point in time and so really the plan at this point in time doesn't really address COVID-19 issues what we've put in the beginning of the plan is that we will have a watching brief really mainly because we didn't really know even at that point whether we'd be living with COVID for the next couple of months or for the longer period as well all indications from the government's chief health advisors tends to be that COVID something we're going to have to live with from now on so we are looking obviously at what the implications of that are we're talking with our partners in terms of the science park and business parks to understand what the implications of that are for new employment floor space for the existing employment floor space as well how many you know workers they expect to have on the site what those workers need by way of amenity we're also talking with others around what type of provision in terms of housing do you need do we need to increase the size of the housing to ensure that actually you've got sufficient space for home working because all of us understand the pressures that that's placed on you know on the kitchen table or wherever else the dining room table wherever people have had to work and especially sharing that with the kids with home learning so and we understand obviously all of us the importance of good Wi-Fi connections good broadband how essential that is to maintaining our communication and our links and we'll need to ensure that you know full fiber to the to the premises included and all the new developments coming forward but it plays through right through to what type of community facilities you provide in the open space you provide in terms of community facilities you know do you have the normal libraries and community centers are we able to use them in the way that we have in the past or do we need to think of new provision and uses for those spaces as well and and ensure that we maximize people's access to to essential amenities and facilities and in regard to open space I think it's more and more not around quantums but about what we need for people's mental health and well-being and we think that Northeast Cambridge is really well placed in that regard in terms of us promoting a very walkable psychable neighborhood where you have all your local amenities within easy walking distance of your house great access to potential jobs in the future but also those strategic cycle and walking connections so that you're still not missing out should you wish to travel a little bit further or need to travel further to to access further amenities that are surrounding us so in that regard I think we're on the right path and certainly the move away from vehicle or traffic and things like that to more sustainable modes and a more compact neighborhood sort of fits with that agenda moving forward so but at the moment we have a watching brief we'll need to monitor talk with our partners talk with everyone moving forward understand what what the implications are and we'll need to adapt the plan and we might not get it right originally and we'll still keep amending and and fearing it depending on what comes up thanks Matt and I think it's it's worth saying that there is a wider discussion here also around the local plan we're having very similar discussions on a more larger scale across greater Cambridge we have a lot of evidence-based studies that are in play for that as well those are going to be reviewed because at the moment we just don't have the data yet to tell us very firmly what COVID is going to have in terms of the economic impact and so forth so the plan with the local plan is also that we're going to be reviewing some of that information in light of COVID in the early months of next year we'll be also sharing that with our elected members looking at what they like to do strategically and so forth as well so all of that will play into the area of action plan we very much are one team developing the area of action plan together with the local plan crossing those issues across and do watch this space because I'm sure we'll be having lots more discussions about this and bringing you as our communities in on that as well over the coming months for sure Anna can I come in as well it's a really interesting one because obviously this stuff is so live but I think you know our job as plan makers is to try and provide some certainty within you know really uncertain you know you know landscape and I think that probably arguably 2020 is probably the least certain time you could be working doing this and I think that you know all of the conversations you know that we're all having now are about around this stuff you know so it's incredibly challenging but it's also you know it also is why we do this this piece of work on why Hannah's saying you know we need to bring it all together and provide certainty where we can but flexibility where it's needed and you know I think you know from the northeast Cambridge perspective I think the vision and is still strong and it still sits there and says you know we can do what needs to be done irrespective of what you know the granularity needs to be in the future of you know having to manage COVID having to manage the impact of you know potentially economic issues around COVID and Brexit so you know we are constantly thinking constantly responding you know government consultation for the white paper is out at the moment as well which is another piece that's going to affect our view and plan making and planning in general in place so you know we are trying to keep a you know keep as much as we can an open mind but give some security where we can to ensure that you know we can provide development and places which are going to be fit for the future and fit for you know future generations to live in and work in. Thanks Paul. Yeah I'm just seeing a few questions starting to come in on the Q&A and do have more if you have them. There's a really good question actually looking to the near future rather than the far future which is what is the situation with current developer applications before the AAP is adopted for example the Chesterton partnership is expanding the area around Cambridge North and St John's have a new application underway which includes some terrible cycling and walking facilities are there any restrictions on current developments if they fail to integrate the proposed new AAP framework? Matt I wonder if you're probably well placed to talk about this because you're involved not to that negotiation. Yeah well unfortunately we cannot prevent new well from developers from submitting planning applications before we've finalised the AAP if you like and we're a number of years away because we're awaiting on the outcome of the development consent order as you said. So any new development that comes forward the A reaction plan because it's only in draft it's at what's called regulation 18 stage at this point in time it's a material consideration but it has very limited weight really. The any application that comes forward would need to be determined against the current local plan policies and they're not that specific and they don't really provide for the types of development that we would like to see through the AAP which is why we're preparing it but they also don't deal with things like how you ensure that actually any of these developments can can mitigate their transport impacts through a shared collaborative approach across the area or how they'll manage the strategic connections that we require the AAP to deliver and and give confidence to members who ultimately approve the planning applications that the things that we want to see as a community and as a council can actually be delivered not in a piecemeal way as Terry said by individual schemes coming forward in isolation but as a joint piece of work which the AAP provides the framework for so it's going to be very difficult like I said we can't stop developers bringing forward planning applications at this stage my alarm's just gone off we need to the wife's cooking sorry we can't prevent them we have to determine their applications we have been working with them we would hope that the proposals that they bring forward are aligned with the area action plan however what we're our aspiration has always been is that that we that the future of this area which is really important Cambridge shouldn't be developer led really in terms of its future outcomes and vision but should be plan led which is you know a shared vision for the space for the place which is a vision from the councils the community the landowners and everyone else and that you know it's an area that benefits all really so yeah I think that I'll leave it there but we do have some some guidance that we have been putting out some interim guidance for developers who are coming forward with applications about how they should refer to the evidence base that we've been developing because that evidence base is a very significant for instance around things like transport so we are expecting just those those applications to show that they have taken heed and been mindful of that evidence base and I think it's also worth reminding everybody that you know you are all community members too and you've you know many of you who are watching or may watch this back as well when you it's on YouTube have been involved in the different consultations and in sharing your views to this consultation you are more than welcome to also share your views on the applications that may come forward over the coming years as well and comment on them and comment on what you'd like to see that you know what you think of their proposals that is the point of the planning process it does operate at many levels not just at the plan making but also at that development management stage where there is the opportunity for everybody in the community to give their comments on those applications in the future I think that's a really good point Hannah and you know one I'd reiterate really we're trying to we'll try and make some of that available as soon as we know when things are happening I think you know the other important thing to mention is that you know we are a collaborative planning service as well and we do like you know we want to talk to our partners and stakeholders and ensure that you know we don't have to you know butt up against a brick wall when we're talking about these things it's about trying to think about what is the best outcome in a systems way rather than saying oh no we're not going to do this so you know it's important for us to keep those developers and the landowners you know fully proofed on what we're doing and make them understand the wider vision for that place and you know I think you know communications is a key part of that too as well and so sorry just to add as well I mean it is fantastic for the AAP that you've got significant developer interest in the place to deliver on the aspiration that we want to see you know often we prepare plans for which you know they sit on the shelves unfortunately because we haven't got that kind of land interest and and bringing things forward nor it takes a significant amount of time so you know you've got to look at it both ways as well one thing is you know whether it's at the development individual application stage or the plan making stage all applications need to be proving that they're sustainable and the sustainable development is ultimately what the area action plan is all about so you know these things should be coming together and I think we will as a planning authority obviously determine according to existing plans and policies but also according to the NPPF and some of those much bigger more overarching themes around climate and sustainability I'm just going to move on to another question that's been asked recently and I know that there's been a little bit of confusion about this in across sort of the social media and online and so forth over the last few days which is just around the question of density in northeast Cambridge and there's questions being asked about an article that was written by someone else not by us which was saying that northeast Cambridge was going to be denser than in a London in terms of people I thought it would be just a useful opportunity here to just unpack that a little bit we didn't really recognize the numbers that were actually in that article but the Greater London Authority did some really interesting work on density a few years ago and there's a study online which we're going to put in the FAQ so that you guys could read that which showed that in a London which is about 10 boroughs actually it kind of goes all the way from Greenwich through to Kensington and Chelsea Camden Lewisham all over the place has a population density of about 108 people per hectare interestingly Paris has a population density of twice that of over 200 people per hectare which just goes to show that all of those little terraced houses in London there really are a lot of them and a lot of them are only two or three stories high but actually northeast Cambridge if you look at the population that we're projecting is actually around that 99 100 people per hectare over the area so it's actually not that dissimilar from the kind of large area in London in terms of the statistics and we are looking at similar densities in terms of the residential typologies to some of areas like you know kind of classic areas like Notting Hill parts of Islington where you've got maybe four, five, six story terraced houses in quite dense arrangements but they do have that amazing sense of place and I think you know we just want to make sure that some of those density arguments are put in perspective Terry mentioned some of the AAP things that we had the other webinars that we've had over the last few weeks and we had one on density in built form so if you're interested in learning a bit more about that I do feel like the TV anchor plugging the previous episodes of my show or my podcast but do go and have a look at the density and built form one because we do unpack what that might look like how that might feel and also some of the examples that we've been drawing on we have looked at best practice from London from other parts of Cambridge from other parts of the country and indeed from abroad but that that sort of you know really wonderful density that you do get in many European cities where the public realm is really generous is really something I think we're aiming for here just moving on to another question about the planning white paper and this is something that has come up a lot as well since the government published this a few weeks ago which is their proposals for planning reform it is just a consultation paper from government at the moment so it definitely is not a legislation or a new requirement on us but obviously we're tracking it very carefully Paul I know you've been looking at this quite a lot maybe do you want to kick off with a little bit about the planning white paper and how as a service we're dealing with this and Matt could talk a little bit about some of the specific question here which is about dividing land into growth renewal and protection areas which is what is proposed in there Thanks Hannah I was going to say I have no idea what you're talking about but yeah so I think you know obviously we have had a lot of questions around you know what are we going to do about the planning white paper I think we've got to be realistic that it came out you know a month ago we have taken some time in digesting it ourselves I mean there are two consultations there's a slightly different consultation which is around some interim changes to the planning system and then there is the white paper which does propose some quite radical changes and it's got some quite radical gaps in it too so you know it isn't legislation at the moment and actually to deliver any of the content within the planning white paper there will be have to be some some pretty radical changes to primary legislation notwithstanding that you know we have to keep an eye on that because you know we are through you know the next few years and a long journey of plan making as not just with the northeast Cambridge AAP but actually with the local planet itself so you know we are likely to see some of those changes come into fruition I think the important thing is that you know irrespective of the mechanisms and functions that you know the evidence bases and all of the other work that we're doing is is critical and fundamental and some of the themes you know within some of the changes mentioned around climate change around digital are themes that we are you know we are thinking that we're you know we're reasonably well you know at the front of of dealing with so you know there are some positives in there too so I just think it's our answers we're going back to government pretty soon we're going to be making our comments back to them as a planning authority and you know it's an open consultation so you know anyone can make a response back to it so if you're watching this you know and you've got views on it yourself make a response back and I'm told I'm told that it's not closed not it's not closed door yet and so you know we should be making these responses back I mean if you're interested in our response I think the closing date is the 29th of October and we'll be putting our formal response back in which is going to go through the relevant council committees over the next month and then we'll make that response available on the website so you can see what our thoughts are on the matter but and how they might relate to some of the work that we're doing does anyone else have got anything on that as well because it's probably quite an interesting subject well Matt on the specific question in the chat here would this mean are the local plan or maybe AAP needs to be more specific than it has in the past what is your view on how that could affect the AAP yeah so I think it would I think it's tongue in cheek to call it a zoning system zone based planning system when you're only talking about three zones really it's it's not it's a very blunt tool really so but yeah I think I can quite easily see that it would require significant changes to how you write local plans for the AAP in particular probably a lot more detail a lot more of us spelling out exactly what it is what we want where and where rather than leaving the detail flexibility if you like to developers it would be for us to essentially write a master plan for the whole area do parameters plans around that as well specify exactly the quantums and types of land use we would want to see provided however it's it then leaves it very much to the marketplace after that the white paper does it seems to suggest that developers can then pick and choose which parts of that they want to deliver upon in terms of the list of land use you put in there it's really unclear how you'll do infrastructure planning in a meaningful way how you'll secure the funding how you'll deliver on the aspirations for affordable housing there's lots of unknowns within that but essentially we'd be writing an outline planning permission as part of our evidence space and as part of our development plan document so yeah it has significant implications for us and the AP is about 50% of the way towards doing an outline planning permission but we'd need to take it the extra 50% with a lot more detail I can probably tell from his accent Matt has experience of the planning system very much a zoned planning system as well and you know a proper planning zone planning system requires a lot of detail in the planning to enable that to provide for permitted development essentially at the end of the day that that enables people to bring forward a planning application but to to give everyone the certainty that what can come forward is what you meant to come forward on that site and and you can't get something that was unexpected really you know and that's the level of detail you require you really do require that that level of information and I think that one of the other things really that you know is absolutely critical not just to the suggestions within the wire paperwork and not the suggestions as they may be is the transition period for whatever happens going forward between a system that we currently operate to a system that may well come forward and you know so until we know those things and have any idea about the how that might work I think it's just so premature to even be thinking about how you could or could not you know and what implication that may well have on you know specific places specific things and you know specific ways of going forward so yeah and it's certainly it's an interesting time saying yeah my main concern with it all is just how much public consultation you can do within that you know they've set out this very short process for doing local plans and there isn't really the amount of community engagement facilitation and and that I would anticipate that people would want to have in a plan that essentially developers planning for mission at the end of the day so I think it would be really interesting to see what comments are coming in on that you know the white paper has said hasn't it that we want community engagement to be at the heart but as you say that maybe some questions about the time scales on that and whether that is achievable and you're all very welcome to comment on that to the government if you wish to because there's definitely a balance to be struck between speed of plan making and local engagement and you know I've got just a quick question that I wanted to bring in Terry here because this is another one that's been asked quite a lot recently as well just about parking Terry and are we banning cars I know we've sort of tried to cover that little bit in the presentation but there seems to be a perception out there that we're essentially banning cars and therefore that's going to cause issues like antisocial parking displacement parking elsewhere that kind of thing could you just kind of clear up some of the misunderstandings on that yeah sure throughout the years I've noticed that nothing gets people worked up from planning policy laws when kind of parking and congestion and traffic so yeah it's a really good question hopefully the presentation sort of made it clear that no we're not banning cars for northeast Cambridge but we are trying to you know think about how people move in a very different way so really building on what's already at the site in terms of public transport and also all of the planned projects and schemes that are already coming forward so Water Beach Greenway are we losing Terry so much happening in that area in terms of sustainable transit as part of that process we're looking at introducing a trip budget for the site now that's something that's quite unusual for a for a plan like this can you still hear me yeah we can yeah okay sorry I'm going to turn my video off because yeah it says that my internet's unstable so yeah so yeah so we're looking at a trip budget for the area it's quite unusual normally you would do kind of predict and provide so you would say it's going to generate this number of cars how many more lanes can we add or how many more junction improvements can we do well actually in this sense what we're saying is these are the number of trips that you're allowed into the area of peak time and that will allow development to come forward but beyond that then that's kind of the limit you know beyond that you're going to create significant congestion and issues and that's just going to cause local air quality problems and it's going to back up onto the A14 which is part of the highways in the network so you know what we're doing is doing something sort of a bit out there a little bit different compared to what most plans would do and that's what the trip budget is in terms of about the site itself you know we aren't one way that we're trying to get people to think differently is not put their cars outside their living rooms what we're saying is if you live at northeast Cambridge you know there'll be a reduced parking onsite for people that live and work there and actually those car parking spaces will be in what we're calling car barns so they're kind of like multi-storey car parks that could be combined with other uses now given the option if you knew that your car was five minutes away and the local shop was five minutes away you wouldn't go and walk to your car then drive to another shop the mindset would be you're a five-minute walk away from the shop I'll just walk to the shop so that's that's essentially what we're trying what we're really trying to do really thinking about these 15-minute neighborhoods that you know you've got day-to-day needs local facilities local services kind of you know we're in a very short walk of your front door there is the possibility that it could result in things like anti-social parking and also the parking displacement elsewhere and that's something that we're really really keen to make sure it doesn't happen you know we've learned a lot of lessons and we're continuing to learn a lot of lessons about development that's happened elsewhere around the city so thinking about developments down in Trumpington and just making sure that we're working with partners such as the county council and others to make sure that we are monitoring and managing parking as development takes place northeast Cambridge is going to take well over sort of you know 15-20 years to be built out so there's going to be lots of opportunities to really make sure that we are on top of this over a long period it's not like we're going to get 20,000 new jobs and 8,000 homes overnight this is going to take a long time and it gives us plenty of opportunity to reflect and consider that as we move forward the trip budget also thinks about deliveries as well just from the whole COVID thing you really start to realise I'm sure everyone's in a similar boat how many online orders turn up on people's streets every single day now and so what we're trying to do is really think about how to coordinate deliveries so kind of logistics hubs and then they can you can do kind of last green mile deliveries like you do in Central Cambridge already so yeah so what's happening in the car and hopefully you manage to heal all of that despite the same miles that are unstable thanks for this super helpful and the thinking again it is about designing the place though isn't it so that it is essentially we're starting from scratch at parts of North East Cambridge and it's about designing it to be low-car or to be cycle pedestrian friendly and prioritised in the first instance and pushing the cars to the French but yeah yeah I wonder if I can just quickly mention to everyone we've got about five minutes left I think and I just I don't know a thing to say that obviously I haven't got any more questions from you live at the moment if you're worried and you know about asking a question you can post anonymously we've got still got five minutes left or so so you can still post we can have do a few more of the FAQs from previous sessions but if you feel unbrave and stick another question up on there I know there's not very many of you tonight but you can stick it in anonymously if you'd like to be down and Joe's obviously just shared where you can get more information we really really do want as many responses as we can get and as I said you can comment online via our website there's email address if you've got any problems with that or any questions we can also still send you out leaflets and we can send out paper copies of things if that's your preferred method or if that's works for your friends your neighbors your family and so forth who might not be so digitally literate and you know we hope that some of the material that we've been putting out on YouTube and on social media and so forth has been helpful we really we really like some feedback on all of that as well we've been trying a lot of new things both because we have to because it's COVID but also because it's the right thing to do and we've learned from the local plan consultation last time around where we did you know definitely a lot more digital than we had previously and I think it really did pay off in terms of the range of responses the types of people we got involved with that so you know we've got a few weeks left please do spread the word I know everyone's really busy but the more people we can have telling us what we think and that is both what you don't agree with but also I think the bits that you do agree with you know if there's something that you really don't want to be lost out of the plan unless you tell us that it's really important to you and that you know it's really important whether it's a connectivity link or whether it's a certain green aspiration we need to hear the things you support as well because otherwise there's always a danger that someone is going to come in and say I don't like it and you know that might end up getting watered down so please do comment back on that as strongly as we can thank you so much okay well we've got a couple more more minutes left and you know I think we're just maybe just worth just telling you that there are the other webinars available online just on that transport one that Terry was talking about we actually did unpack a bit more of that and showed some images and some of the Wona Earth streets which are the kind of Dutch streets that are very much in a way the model for what we're looking for here how people actually manage to make streets that do feel really wonderful they don't ban the car but they are definitely places where your your five-year-old your six-year-old feels happy cycling around playing with their friends and so forth so do check out some of them Joze also put up the FAQs we put up a lot of other questions from some of the other chats there and so forth and finally I think just because it is the last of our our sessions here just to say thank you to everybody who's been involved it's been really really great we've had some really fantastic attendance through the whole series we're all now feeling like we're Paul and I feel I think we're not about 10 webinars in the last so we've just done so many across this and the local plan but it has been just really amazing we had about 100 people earlier on talking about the local plan so you know we hope it's been effective for all of you thanks everyone who's listened in thanks everyone who's also sending in comments we've seen hundreds of comments coming into the inbox so far so we're looking forward to reading them all and yeah don't know Paul if there's anything else I've missed there yeah no I think I just agree really I mean you know it's been a bit of a brave new world for us I mean running this consultation with this started sort of in July and you know we were really wondering how it was going to go in this kind of in this format but it has been really good like so we've had lots and lots of comments so the the board view it's been positive and I think that you know something we're definitely going to keep even if it's not around formal consultations as we said Hannah said we've just done a couple webinars on the local plan and that's not in a consultation period at the moment we're just doing some you know some panel sessions on frequently asked questions it's helpful for us to get an understanding of the questions you're asking and be able to answer them up front or at least put them on our website as well because if you've asked the question no doubt you know 100 other people have got that you know that same question and I think it's really important for us to be able to see that stuff as Hannah said go to the website all of the recorded sessions from the northeast Cambridge session are there there are some specific you know topics as well so there's stuff about housing green spaces design and density as you know so if you know you can sort of unpack some of those topics in a little more detail you know the chances are we'll be running a few more of these over the next few months in relation to both you know what we're doing here and also some of the you know the the government consultation might even do a session on that God forbid and then you know I think that you know we'll you know we'll try and keep this going and the dialogue is great so you know thank you all for making this easy for us I wish I could see you all as much as I love seeing my colleagues it's only my colleagues I can currently see so and you know other than that I think thanks to the team thanks to the panel thanks to everybody who's put this consultation together and it's got another two weeks left to run get your comments in and get to the website and other than that have a lovely Monday evening and have a great week everybody thanks Paul thanks Paul thank you everyone thanks see you