 Llywydd, ddweud heddiw gyda'n gweithio gydag webinarol o gweithfael, i gweithio. Ddwy'n gweithio i'ch gael adrodd yma.路eddoedd yn cael hynny i hefyd o gadw i'r eich ei iawn i'n eu defnyddio'r ffordd. Dwi'n gweithio i'n rhoi twist. Rwy'n gweld hannol, Loughnos. Rwy'n gwneud o ymddir yma yng Nghymru o'r gwaith gwaith yma. A ydych chi i gael i'w f товiniadol a'r gweithfornig o'r ddaeth gweithfawr. here, so we've very much been looking after a lot of the consultation elements of this plan. Just a few bits about how today is going to work. We're going to do a really quick presentation for you going over some of the detail in the area of action plan around biodiversity and open spaces, and then we're going to look at the Q&As that hopefully you'll start posting into the Q&A panel at the bottom here. We've got some great panel members and they're going to introduce themselves in a minute, but just a little bit of housekeeping. Obviously this is a recorded session, so we are going to be not reading out people's names when they post their questions because that's obviously a GDPR issue, and please obviously do try to keep the questions on topic as much as possible. We have got some other webinars coming up and we'll post details of them towards the end, so if there are other things that our panel here can't answer, we'll either answer them in written answers which we'll put on our website, or we'll also carry them through to other webinars that we have coming up. So I'm just going to go through my lovely colleagues here and introduce you all to them. Firstly, Terry. Good evening everybody. My name is Terry De Souza. I'm a principal planning policy officer at the Greater Cambridge Shared Planning Service, and I was one of the officers that has been involved in preparing the plan and all the evidence-based documents that sit behind it. Hi, I'm Matthew Pedersen. I'm the project lead for developing the Northeast Cambridge Area Action Plan for the Shared Planning Service. Dan? Hi, I'm Dan Weaver. I'm the ecology officer for Cambridge Shared Service. I have to admit I am sitting in for Guy Belcher at the moment. He's actually a holiday and Guy's been involved in the preparation of the plan, but I will do my best to cover for him and answer questions that come to us. Thank you, Bruce. Good evening. My name is Bruce Waller. I'm a principal planning policy officer in the Greater Cambridge Shared Planning Service, and I've been involved with developing the policies in a local plan and helping curate the evidence base. Good evening everybody. I'm Greg McAddeachan, planning consultant at the Shared Planning Service. Someone to the others, really, been working on NEC, preparing evidence and writing policies. I love you, Carly. Oh, there she is. Hi, my name is Jo Burnham, and I support the Greater Cambridge Shared Planning Service with consultation and engagement, and I'm here to support with hosting the webinars. Thank you, everybody. So, we're just going to, as I said, just do a really quick overview of some of the aspects to do with biodiversity and open spaces. I'm just going to share my screen now, so hopefully those will start to come up in front of you shortly. Just give me one second while I get this up properly, because it's not totally instant. Oh, sorry, Jo. I think you need to unshare your screen. There we are. So, Terry, I'm going to hand this over to you. Firstly, obviously, we've done it just through a little run-through of NEC generally, and then on to the open spaces. Thank you, Hannah. I've just turned my camera off because I'm having some slight IT issues with maintenance speed, so hopefully you'll all be able to hear me if you can't see me. Okay, so North East Cambridge, as you can see, it's the area shown in orange, so it's all the land between the railway line, all the way across Milton Road, and includes Cambridge Science Park and Cambridge Regional College. Now, it's a huge site. It's 180 hectares of brownfield land, which is larger than Cambridge City Centre, and to give you a sense of scale, if you walk from one side of the site to the other, it's the equivalent of walking from the Beehive Centre to the Baxed, so it really is a huge site with lots of potential. It's got some really good transport accessibility at the moment, and this will improve significantly over the coming decades, so we've got the railway line, the guided busway, the chiswn trails being built at the moment, and also the proposals for things that just can as well. It's only a 15-minute cycle ride from the city centre, so it's got really good accessibility to a lot of the main services and facilities in town, but there are a range of landowners within this area, from Trinity who own the Science Park to St John's College who own the Innovation Park, and so the area of action plan is really important to try and coordinate planning across this area over the plan period and beyond. The site is strategically important as well for Greater Cambridge and the wider region, which includes the Oxford to Cambridge Arc, and one of the real key things that's come out of speaking to communities over the last couple of years, particularly the last round of consultation, was that local communities must really benefit from development of this site. It really can't be about us and them. The development needs to spread its benefits, address deprivation in the wider area as well. So what is an area of action plan? So an area of action plan is a planning framework. It has a number of policies within it that any development that comes forward would need to comply with. It has the equivalent status to a local plan, so it has a number of evidence-based documents that underpin it, I think at the moment we're up to 53, and it also goes through a process which is similar to a local plan. So we've got consultation at the moment. We will take all the comments into consideration, seek to finalise the plan, and then we will consult again before we go to an independent examination where there will be an open inquiry with an independent chair from the planning inspectorate. As you can see by the diagram, it sits just below the national planning policy framework and alongside the local plans. So the vision for North East Cambridge. So we had a vision from the last consultation and we took those comments on board and we've tweaked it slightly. So at the moment the vision is we want North East Cambridge to be an inclusive, walkable, low carbon, new city district with a lively mix of homes, workspaces, services, and social spaces fully integrated with surrounding neighbourhoods. So we've picked out some headline figures for you. So as you can see there you've got the size of the site which I've already mentioned. There are three homes within the site despite its size. There are three homes on the sewage treatment worksite which not many people know about. There are around 15,000 jobs on the site at the moment, and there are roughly 4,500 unused car parking spaces on Cambridge Science Park based on the traffic data that we've been collecting over the last few years. But in the future this is what the plan is seeking to achieve is 8,000 homes which would be for 18,000 residents and 40% is what we're aspiring for in terms of affordable housing. We think that we can create 20,000 new jobs on top of the 15,000 that are already there and that's not just jobs in terms of office space and R&D, that's also industry and retail as well. And then also new public spaces as well which is what we're coming on to today where we've got 10 new hectares of public parks and squares as well as three new primary schools, a new library, a number of improved walking and cycling connections as well. So green spaces so in terms of what the plan sets out is that we've got a range of green spaces across the area action planning area. So the main one is what we call the linear park. Now that is the park that stretches from Nuffield Road so if you can imagine where, thank you Hannah, if you can imagine where the allotments are on Nuffield Road at the moment, they stretch right all the way up through the site up to the A14 and then under into Milton Country Park. So that's about a kilometre in length in total. It also goes east over the railway line and goes into an area which we call Chestam Fenn which is an area of land. It's outside of the action plan area but a space that we think we can set aside for open space as well as biodiversity improvements as well. We also have a number of neighbourhood green spaces. Now they're not shown on this diagram because they fall within the grey areas so there are the sort of smaller scale neighbourhood areas within that and also green streets. One of the key things that we're aiming for in the area action plan is to really try and reduce the number of people that need to travel by car. As I said we've already got really good transport facilities at the moment. It's in a really good place in terms of jobs and other facilities that we're looking to provide on the site. So it really opens up the opportunity to create streets for people, proper streets where there isn't on-street car parking except for blue badge holders and access and the street becomes less about the car and more about the people and the activities within it. I've also talked about Chestam Fenn and how North East Cambridge will link to the River Cam. We're so lucky in the sense that this site is on the edge of Cambridge so it has really, geographically it's so close to Milton Country Park, it's close to the river and the wider fence. So this is a real opportunity to not just for people that are going to be living and working in North East Cambridge, but those that live around the area at the moment to improve their accessibility to the wider countryside. So you could be at Nunsway Pavilion for example and be able to walk all the way through North East Cambridge under the A14 and you could be in Milton Country Park without even having to go along any sort of main roads or you could go over the railway line, intergest them, fenn on the river corridor again without having to walk down Milton Road or get into your car. So this is just to sort of explain what I've talked about already slightly. So number one is that linear park and then we've got the area number two which is what we're calling Cowley Triangle so that's opposite St John's Innovation Park. We then have the kind of what we're calling the Green High Street which is trying to integrate the first public drain which runs through the site at the moment and is I think to better say a slightly unloved feature of this part of Cambridge and how we can really integrate that into this new high street for the district and actually it becomes a real key feature not only in terms of public realm but also in terms of biodiversity as well. We are then looking to we've obviously got the Science Park open spaces at the moment which is number four and how we can try and improve some of those open spaces as well on the edges of the site so really trying to draw people into the Science Park and into North East Cambridge more generally. So you've got Cambridge Park Brook which is just over there and then you've got Science Park Place which is where we're proposing to put a small local centre in at the Science Park and then the last one is Station Place which would be a small green space connecting Cambridge North Station and the new district centre. So in terms of scale and amount there like I said there's a number of new parks which we're proposing so if you took the linear park and Cowley Triangle so just those two not including the Science Park Brook and all the others that gives you 10.6 hectares of major strategic open space so to give you an example it's slightly bigger than what park is pieces at the moment if you combine those together. We've got about 8.8 hectares of existing public space so thinking about what's in the Science Park at the moment for example and then think and then those neighbourhood spaces which aren't shown on our diagrams which are just under seven hectares of space in total so all together these equate to around about 25-26 hectares of open space which is the equivalent of Jesus Green and Midsummer Common combined. So we've got some really important principles for open space so what we're trying to do is not just create large areas of lawn effectively whilst those are really important and obviously people need space to kick a ball around. Open spaces need to be multifunctional as well so they're actually well used throughout the year by a whole range of people from the young to the old and just making sure that we create open spaces that are really climate resilient as well so you're not creating football pitches that effectively you can't use for half the year because they're underwater or they're waterlogged and also making sure that our landscaping really thinks about the effects of climate change and making sure that we create open spaces that are sort of drought or climate change resilient and also integrating sustainable drainage systems as well. So these are some of our examples of open space just taken from elsewhere so one of the documents you can read online is called our typology study and it's basically examples of developments from elsewhere so we haven't just looked at buildings we've also looked at open spaces as well. So starting from the top left this is an example of a linear park as you can see a whole range of different functions there from seating to play to water features, shading it's actually hard to believe that that's actually sitting on top of a shopping centre you wouldn't know it but it gives you an example of how you can create really good quality open spaces in quite innovative ways. The centre top picture is an example of how you could maybe try and imagine what Cowley Road could look like in terms of the high street and how you could create a linear sort of central park along that high street. The top right picture gives you an example of those neighbourhood spaces so that one's taken from Copenhagen as you can see the scale of the buildings you're looking at sort of seven stories buildings within this area but how that green space can be used to help you know help offset offset that provide provide those sort of door step areas really of open space which are so important to a whole range of people and then thinking about the more private open spaces so the bottom left picture is from Ocean Estate in Stepney in London that's an example of an internal courtyard so that is a space that's open to the residents that live within that block. Obviously none of those none of those open spaces are shown on any of our diagrams in the plan but those those are the types of things that we would be expecting development to have to include as it comes forward. The bottom middle picture is an example of a podium garden so that's actually above street level I think it's actually got a sainsbury's underneath it and it just shows how you again you can create those kind of communal spaces for the residents in a in a quite innovative way really and then the top one is taken from the states where it shows how you can use the roof spaces as well now obviously they might not be a proper floor uses but you know things like food growing which was a really a really good discussion that we had at the last Q&A webinar so it just sort of shows examples of open space and then it gets to think about streets as well as I said you know people won't be parking outside their outside their front doors and so it really allows us to reimagine what the street could be like so you know imagine imagine your street with no cars on it you know what could you do with that space between the buildings there's so much we can do this just gives you a flavour I'm not saying that this is all going to happen at northeast Cambridge but it just gives you a flavour of actually there are so much there are so much possibilities of what we can do between buildings in these spaces so whilst we're thinking about you know open space I don't think we should forget that streets are part of that and that they play an important role in people's well-being and their amenity as well and then biodiversity so the plan seeks to achieve a 10% biodiversity net gain which is what the government is requiring new development to do as part of the forthcoming environment bill and so that's really about embedding biodiversity in design of all buildings and streets from the very very beginning and improvements in size quality diversity as well as the relationship of the sites habitats as well with each other's and those around it and we're seeking to protect and enhance as much of the biodiversity in the site as possible and that includes things like the Cowley road hedgerow which most people don't know about but it's a you know a real possible contender as a city wildlife site and secure inappropriate mitigation and habitat management monitoring through legal agreements as well so we're just going to go through a few of the questions that people have been asking on social media and so forth recently about open spaces and biodiversity before we come on to all of your Q&As which are common for who's taking this first question actually what open spaces will the public be able to access an obviously really important one that Terry has helped on I think it's me actually thanks Hannah uh yeah so Terry's run through pretty much the sort of strategic open spaces that will be available so the linear park the triangle site around Cowley road the civic spaces around the the station and also in the district centre that we're proposing as well as the green spaces that are already in the science park so those are big strategic open spaces that are available to the public but at the at the next level down if you like there will be a raft of sort of neighborhood parks pocket parks those sorts of things playgrounds for children play spaces for teenagers and other multi games areas things like that which will sit at that next layer down that will be publicly available as well before you get down to sort of the site level where you expect to have private amenity space and and gardens like that but even within that it may be that some of those open spaces the private ones could be open during the day for most people to walk through to connect up to different places and it may be that they're just closed at night for security purposes another question that actually we're doing an in-person consultation today in Monsway and some people are asking about this as well have things connect outside of the area or action plan area who's taking this one is this one well if you want to do it personally I'll do it for you. You do it Greg you do it. Well I mean I think Terry's touched on this already there's going to be a green infrastructure strategy that at a strategic level that's going to be developed which this site will link into so as part of that the site's already going to be as Terry's already alluded to it's going to link to Milton Country Park we're going to obviously Chester and Fenn as well and then the wider River Corridor and the Chisholm Trail going further further up so that there's already identified connections in place we're looking at other potential connections sort of histons sort of side of the site as well and you know and then obviously connecting the site into to existing you know existing areas that are in the wards to the south so places like Monsway and Bramblefields and the like so the open spaces the strategic open spaces anyway are going to form a strategic function within NEC area as well as the wider network you know through the green infrastructure strategy. Lastly about the habitats in and around North East Cambridge we've touched on Cowley Road hedgerow but I know there's obviously been an awful lot of work looking at wider habitats. Yeah so we were very lucky that MK Air Ecology produced a biodiversity assessment of the entire area which they published in February of this year so they've actually gone through everywhere and had to look to see what we've got and I think the answer is a surprisingly more than you would think in an area that's actually as built up as it is so there are areas of woodlands the largest being sort of between the water treatment plants and the A14 in the northeast of the site. There are also areas of grassland so quite a lot of it's immunity grassland but other areas of more sort of species rich what we call semi improved grassland. We also had places like brutal vegetation so things like brambles and nettles and things like that where you get lots of different butterflies working. There's also areas of ponds and I think probably the more important one one of the more important ones is the public first drain so that is a wet drain that has been running you know through that area for a very long time. It's got a lot of associated species to it especially things like water bowl that are in the area so again it's very important for biodiversity. The hedgerows that have been mentioned are actually really important because they've been around for a long time they are from what I understand their remnants of the original field system hedgerows that were left in places as kangrys sort of was expanded and built around them so they are very important and then even things like the buildings themselves can become habitats we have lots of birds and bats that will live inside of those buildings so there is actually sort of more habitats that you would think would be there you know on the first glance. Around the outside we've got probably most important area would be things like the river cam which runs quite close by. The river cam itself is a protected area it's a local county wildlife site and obviously chest and fen which is next door which hopefully we'll be able to use as a almost like a receptor site to help really boost biodiversity in the area. Hannah sorry I was also going to add the area that's going to form part of the bund that for the A14 noise barrier we're looking at possibilities of how that can be multifunctional as well as not just for noise attenuation but also for habitat creation for green infrastructure wildlife corridor links as well so I'll just mention that. Fantastic. Thanks I'm just going to stop my share now and I can see some questions connecting in here. So first question, areas connecting to did not mention the mere way. That's true actually and that is a really important connection that we're going to be using for northeast Cambridge. I wonder if anyone wants to maybe would Terry like to talk to that because I know there's been a lot of discussion around that. Yeah absolutely yeah so mere ways are really important route going north particularly with the cycle improvements that are beginning to be coming through there as part of the water beach development so yeah so that will also act as a really important route for people to access the wider countryside so yeah absolutely so apologies I didn't mention it in the presentation but yeah that is that is part of the plan as well. One of the other things with the connectivity is that it's not just the sort of if you like the green network connectivity there is also the street level connectivity and things like the guided busway that at the moment a real barrier to movement there are many many new crossings that are looking at that we're looking at producing as part of the area action plan so there'll just be a lot of different ways that people can filter through the site and then up to things like a mere way and the other cycle routes around the area. Next question I can see coming up here what interaction if any would you envisage with the adjoining allotment site I wonder if maybe Bruce might want to talk to this. Thank you well I don't think we've necessarily looked in sort of detail of how actual individual sites might interact but I think we would look to make sure that the current site any sort of the new development integrates with local communities so I think where there's opportunities to work with what already exists on the periphery will take full advantage of but clearly that will be nearer the time when perhaps more detailed proposals are put forward but clearly the intention is to integrate the new development northeast Cambridge with the existing communities all around and working with allotment holders perhaps and who managed them will be an opportunity to do that. Does anybody else want to in? You go Greg. I was just going to quickly say there's going to be there's going to be some legibility with the AAP work as well so where you know we're not necessarily potentially creating physical connection new physical connections to for example but the allotments there will certainly be you know whole scale legibility signage improvements throughout the throughout the whole site so you can understand and understand the scale as well of where facilities like the allotments are from various places in the site. Yeah I know it's just going to add that we obviously included the allotment site when we went out to issues and options consultation in terms of the boundary of the AAP area but we recognised that actually all we were seeking to do through the AAP was to protect that so it was actually better to take it out we don't want that site developed at all we want to maintain them protect this allotments it's really important to that local community and it will be important to to new residents as well within northeast Cambridge. Thanks Matt. I was wondering if one thing we actually didn't touch on too much was and we touched on the connectivity to Milton Country Park but we didn't touch on some of the discussions with Milton Country Park and I know that has been raised by some people as well in terms of the capacity of Milton Country Park. I wonder if we might be able to just clarify a bit on that for the audience here today. Maybe I'll give that one to Matthew. Yeah that's fine I'll deal with this one. Yeah so we have we've been engaging with the Milton Country Park for a long time on the AAP. Obviously we are all sensitive to the existing pressures that that parks under in terms of meeting needs and demands at time and we've talked obviously with the surrounding local communities and who utilise that park significantly and that's one of their concerns too but they also see the benefits of having a better access more sustainable access to that park to be able to access it more frequently as well and not just by driving but walking and cycling will be a huge benefit and then we're talking to the park mainly about how we we're obviously seeking to provide sufficient open space on site but it is a regional park and therefore is available to all residents within the Greater Cambridge area to come and utilise that area so we're talking to them about how we could potentially look at ways and means of increasing capacity within that through the facilities provided through different management regimes as well for the park to enable that to take place but I think again it's open at the moment to look at and work with them to determine and the wider community to determine what is the best outcome for the regional park and ensure it is maximised in terms of its use but we also protect it in terms of its its value as a wildlife site in here in open space. Thanks. I hope everyone knows how to do that but I've just had a question about um how can people feed in their ideas for creative uses of open space well this is a really good question because of course this is what we're doing at the moment with the consultation itself we really want to hear as many views as possible on what we should be including these are draft policies and these are draft ideas at this stage so they're very much things that we're going to be evaluating in light of the comments that we receive you can comment online so we have an online comment system at grotocainbridgeplanning.org slash nec and you can go there and have a look and you can also email us and we'll be posting the details of the email address and so forth at the end of this so we really do want as many comments from members of the public as possible because it's so important that that comes into us and that we can make sure that we're meeting your needs as well as everything else. Just to add to that I mean we are looking at really innovative approaches for NEC, Erie took us through some of the examples of things we're looking at that the other schemes have provided and we are looking for ideas from anyone and we're very open to those ideas we're still at draft plan stage so it's people's chance to influence the plan significantly and certainly we understand even with COVID-19 that how we utilise and how we appreciate and value open spaces is really key and we have to look at innovative ways of how we provide it but also how we utilise it and make efficient use of that asset and resource for the city. Can I just add that we're really keen to also up the help and well-being agenda for NEC so again we feel like the open spaces are a key opportunity to help encourage people to lead healthier lifestyles and it's basically and it's not just like a seasonal option where open spaces which are perhaps only encouraged they use during the good of the better weather but we want really open spaces to be those which can be used all year round so for example there the tracks don't aren't susceptible to being muddy when there's been heavy rains so we are keen to get people's ideas on how we can encourage people to lead healthier lifestyles open spaces which encourage people to use them people lead lead very sort of how should I say people's nine to five routine is often not not not not not not not kind of something we do these days people work what hours want to do open space or activities first thing in the morning late at night so it's basically ideas on how we can have the open spaces sort of meeting the needs of people who can basically lead a healthy lifestyle throughout the year thanks one other thing that has been asked recently has been about the 10% biodiversity net gain and can we or should we be doing more than that I know that's a really tricky one Dan but I'm wondering if you can just speak to that just briefly um yeah absolutely so I mean the the 10% net gain is is a bare minimum so I mean it's absolutely possible to go beyond that if we take a look at some of the city deal projects some of the transport hubs that are being looked at at the moment proposed what they are saying is they will have a minimum 10% but they're actually targeting 20% net gain now this is what we would call measurable net gain so this is net gain in terms of provision of habitats now there are other types of ecological and biodiversity enhancements that we can actually include that would not be included within that 10% or 20% category so things like having habitat boxes having rusting boxes having nesting boxes having log piles or hedgehog holes in fences or things like that will all add to the biodiversity area or they may not necessarily be measured in the same way so I think the 10% is the bare minimum but we can always aim to go higher than that if we have the capacity to do so. That's brilliant. I mean for those of us because it always sounds a bit like how on earth does one measure biodiversity I wonder if you could just talk a little bit more about how that actually does get measured when you talk about quantified net gain. Absolutely sure so it is a little bit complicated I'll try not to be too specific so we have what we would call matrices or calculations that we can undertake and it gives a value to certain habitats so those habitats are valued on their diversity on their contribution to species and so on so for example an amenity grassland so just a grass in the field the grass net has a lower value than a wildflower meadow so they are measured differently so what we can actually do is we can allocate allocate numbers to them and create a value of habitats for the entire area so for example we would say this area is worth 50 units of biodiversity so when we then put our overlay our developments on top of that land and we see what is being removed and what is being taken we can see well actually we're going to lose 30 units of those 50 units of biodiversity and therefore we need to make sure that we're not just losing that 30 percent we're going to recreate that 30 percent somewhere sorry 30 units somewhere else but we're actually also going to add another three units so we're going to create 33 units of new habitat so it is quite complicated our DEFRA have been going through several iterations of these calculations the latest calculations in beta mode it's called the DEFRA metric two point home it's very cool if you're a bit of a nerd like me then you'll really love it um there are other matrices available as well just in case so Warwickshire County Council have their own matrix and also there's an organisation called the Environment Bank which use another matrix as well so they are very similar but they have slightly different underlying assumptions but all are valid in certain ways thank you that makes sense that was a really good answer thank you very much um another question that has been asked recently is very simple one will there be space to kick a board about um Terry I wonder if you you might answer that one yeah sure yeah uh yes like I said so um some of these strategic open spaces that we're proposing um you know they are they are large and when you when you sort of combine all of those spaces together then you know like I said there's 25 26 hectares of open space in total um that we're proposing just at that sort of higher level they're not including those sort of neighbourhood spaces so absolutely um plus like I'll say you know we need to sort of rethink the street as well and think about you know how people use those spaces you know I remember being a child with you know quite normal to kick a ball about in the street but you know these days you can't because you know you've got so much on street car parking and you know and all that kind of thing so yeah absolutely um there's and obviously you know all of the schools will come with um their own play facilities as well um and you know it's really standard practice these days to make sure that schools have community use agreements tied into them so you know when the schools aren't using their fields and they're you know their play facilities that they're open to the public um so yeah so that's something else that we'd be you know looking to do yeah and just just to add to that I mean we are like I said we're looking at innovative ways so instead of providing you know uh for say four soccer pitches grass soccer pitches we might look at putting in uh 3g pitches which um you can uh you can use more often don't require the same amount of maintenance um can put flood lighting on can split up as well so uh it just ensures that actually uh you can utilise a smaller amount of space and get twice as much use out of it for the local community so it's that kind of innovation that we're looking at thanks for that's really interesting just in terms of cheston fen we sort of talked about this area quite a bit in terms of access what do we think it's actually going to be useful because I know that we've also talked about it in terms of flood residents and water storage as well and I know that's something that people are quite interested in yeah I can take that one um yeah so cheston fen it obviously it's um it's by the river it's within the flood plain um so it's really important that you know we aren't putting football pitches and and such like on that area um because that wouldn't really be appropriate so what we're saying is that you can create um informal community space on that area so you know the sort of place where you know people can go and walk their dog and you know have a picnic that kind of thing um but it's also uh a place where we think that we can create some real biodiversity improvements as well um really trying to draw in the river the river corridor and really being that kind of link between the river and the site and northeast Cambridge and so you know there's real chance for biodiversity improvements in that area so yeah so there's a bit of a mixture really the ecologist is saying that you know because of the flooding issues um that there are in parts of that area you know you could you could really create like almost like a wetland in places with you know sort of wetland habitats and that kind of thing so there is so much scope um to do to do some real real good um amenity and biodiversity improvements in that area That does leave off to this wider question that has been asked quite a bit about there the thing that's technically known as SUD so sustainable drainage systems and how that counts with the open space areas that we are giving in the plans Terry I know that you've sort of been quite good on this in the past maybe you want to just explain how that works sorry Hannah could you repeat that sorry just about the the sustainable drainage systems because there's always been this question about do those areas actually count as public open space or not because we want a lot of sustainable drainage systems areas within our MEC don't we we do yeah so the the sustainable urban drainage systems or SUDs um they don't count as your open space because essentially they're you know they're waterways and you know they they're useful water storage so they don't count but the is really important that they are part of that landscaping so they're fully integrated within those open spaces so it's not just the case of creating channels under the ground and storage tanks under the ground actually they become a feature so they link into the first public drain you know you could have swales you could have attenuation ponds that kind of thing so you know there's real scope to make sure that you know these drainage systems are part of the landscape but not part of the open space numbers um so yeah so there's a lot there's a lot of scope there to bring it together and what the plan is seeking to do is trying to make sure that there's a coordinated approach to SUDs as well so it's not just that piece more bit you know we're one developer does one thing and one developer does another thing um you know which is trying to make sure that you know we have a SUDs network for for northeast Cambridge overall as well which is really important and and also biodiversity networking of standard for the uh virtual i've just had a question in about more about the sports provision kicking a ball about is fine on informal space but many sports need formal space that cannot go on a 3g pitch like tennis croquet cricket and hockey um i think Matt maybe you can answer that because you were talking about the 3g 3g pitch question yeah i think the 3g was just the the kicker ball around one but certainly you'll have tennis courts within the areas in particular we're looking at even innovation for tennis courts having them on top of say you could have them on top of a carpark and things like that so innovative ways of providing them but you'll have traditional tennis courts and the like uh in terms of bigger um spaces for like cricket and even hockey facilities and things like that we're doing the open spaces strategy as part of the local plan um and we need to understand what's required for NEC but what's required for northeast Cambridge more generally so we're looking at um obviously if you're going to provide a hockey pitch is it better here or is it better somewhere else that meets a wider need of a much wider community um so we're looking at where where the right locations are for those things that either will be provided forward within NEC or NEC development will contribute towards provision somewhere else and we're also protecting some of the existing spaces aren't we at Cambridge Regional College and so forth some of their facilities yeah definitely so they've got multi-use games areas out the back and things like that and certainly um there's uh scope within the science park as well um to provide further community facilities that would be available for leisure needs of the workers during the day and potentially residents and others during the the evening and that would serve both um new houses on the other side of Milton Road but also uh with the connections and links that we're looking to make with King's Hedges and Milton and others would bring uh actually community on to the science park to make use of those facilities as well um there's a question about trees which is a really interesting one about what consideration we've been giving to planting trees throughout the site um I know that the Cambridge tree strategy is is really the one that we are adopting in terms of the standards and approach to canopy cover and increasing tree coverage across the area for climate reasons when there's other things but maybe I don't know if that's something that Bruce or or Greg maybe would speak to or Dan maybe who let's say one of Dan talks that I think you know about trees then um I I I luckily I have been sitting next to the tree officer for some time in the office so a little bit um I think it's it's it's it's along the lines of getting the right trees in the right places and making sure that they are going to survive where they are so it's it's you do quite often come across some developments the plant inappropriate trees and inappropriate places so I think given the space that we have especially in the open spaces and in those large green streets being able to plant larger trees in those areas you know will be really really beneficial obviously they can help with things like pollution and might be taking microbes out of the air they can help with urban cooling they can help with shading as well so I think the more we can sort of introduce trees into the into the area the the the health view is going to be for everybody. Thanks very much. There's a some something we've been asking online about whether overspaces will be while letting safe use at night and there's obviously always a cross over here isn't there between sort of wildlife and dark skies issues and making sure that they are safe and well used in terms of being good roots. Matt maybe you would speak to that. Yeah yeah happy to um yeah I mean primarily we're looking at a network of green spaces that provide your connections really your walking and strategic cycling connections to get to your places so they all need to be available throughout the day in the evening and into the night and they need to be well lit and overlooked and well managed and so certainly on those areas yes beyond those you'll have private amenity spaces as well where obviously again you know you'll you expect to have a level of security on those two and a level of overlooking and but certainly where we have areas of biodiversity we we would hope that those are not lit if you like they're dark areas for the bats and the others and they're just natural habitats and and during the day they'll provide fantastic amenity and during the evening obviously screening and things like that from from other light pollution um but you know you'll get a combination but for the vast majority of areas that are the main thoroughfares that are the key cycle and walking connections they should be very safe and secure and everyone should feel and hopefully very active and live as well in terms of what we're providing within the area and um you know you should have kids playing in the streets and people walking around so it should be should feel very safe for all of those in the community. Thanks I was wondering sometimes management of open spaces is something that comes up as a real issue on developments like this you know who's actually going to run them in the long term and what those agreements might look like and we see this as really early days and this is a 20 year plan so we definitely know that we're going to have a lot of work to do on this but have there been any initial discussions about some of that stuff across with the landowners and so forth? Yeah we have we've been in discussions obviously um ideally I mean as as we've said it's it's going to take a long time to build out NEC and it'll be very much a phase development across different land parcels and therefore the responsibility will fall to the developers in the first instance or the landowners to manage that those open spaces get them well established really well utilized get all the facilities and and and then we're looking at obviously them contributing towards the long term maintenance of those parks if as Dan says we need the right species in the right places in terms of trees to make sure that actually the levels of maintenance aren't huge in terms of being drought resistant and all the other things so but they still will need ongoing management maintenance to ensure they're fit for purpose and so we're looking at how the developments within there and the users may contribute towards that and it may be that once the development's complete the councils will look at either taking in that over or it could be that a management company uh a body corporation of the whole area takes takes on that because it may be associated with things like the management of the sustainable drainage system as well how that's up kept because we need to keep that up to date as well in terms of its management to ensure that it does what it's meant to do um obviously we're looking at um doing transport hubs around the area so they need management ongoing as well about how you ensure that different sites contribute towards those and people have good access to those facilities and so there's a raft of management across the piece and it may be that it might not just seem to fall to the councils to do but it could be under a body court and it could be actually community managed so you know a residence association led kind of body um that that take take the lead on that but yes as you say it's early doors and we're still open for for ideas and innovation and we're looking at what other people are doing as well so i'm following on from that this is a very good question that's coming that says these ideas seem excellent well done Matt your ideas seem excellent but cynics might ask how confident you are that developers will take them fully on board something planning authorities have no teeth yeah yeah nothing that can be the case but we're kind of in a really lucky position in northeast Cambridge and the vast majority of landowners aren't in it just to do a development and then leave you've got the likes of the council and trinity and crown and the science park and john's all have a vested interest a long long term vested interest in these sites and then the areas are whole and therefore they want and need to see ongoing management to realise the for their own selfish means i mean the the strategic financial benefits at the end of the day of letting properties and and getting new tenants into some of these science buildings and other things and making the area nice so that workers want to come and work here and people want to live here so i think um we are very confident and that we also understand it's going to take a long time to build out so we have the ability to continue to work with them and if things aren't working initially we have time and to fix those problems with them as well and find solutions to issues yeah i suppose more broadly this is really why we're doing the area reaction plan in the first place isn't it because we do need the specific policy so we can hold developers to efficient without a coordinated policy it might be that we wouldn't have enough teeth as it were to to control that development would you say that was a case that yeah yeah sure i was taking it more from the the management maintenance side of the open spaces but yeah no certainly the the overarching purpose of why we're doing an AAP is to set out what the council and communities expectations are for development here and certainly we again that long build out process enables us to ensure that actually we get significant compliance because if they don't comply the first time around we're unlikely to give them planning permission again for the next part of their phase development so they need to work with us in the communities as much as we need to work with them to get a development that we're all content with and satisfied that delivers on the vision that we want for the area and the objectives that we've set out in the AAP. One thing I would say just from the consultation perspective is that if you do think some of these ideas seem excellent please tell us that in the consultation because the more we hear from you support for some of these ideas the more evidence we have to put into the area action plan going forward and to put to those developers to say these ideas really are well supported by the community so whilst we so want to hear criticism and we want to hear what we could do better we do want to hear where we've got it right because that really strengthens our hand when we're speaking to developers and landowners in the area to say you know these aren't just ideas that we're sort of coming up with and these are actually ideas that people out there in the community really care about so please please a little bit of a plug for our consultation but please please do write to us online or in pay perform and tell us which of the ideas you think are excellent as well as the ones that you could do better on. I think Jo is actually just going to on that point start to share some of the details of that consultation so you can have a look. So firstly we've got a few more webinars coming up in September and we've got about just over five five and a half weeks to go yet in the consultation so there's still plenty of time to kind of read the documents and hear more about it. We've got four more webinars coming up on different aspects of northeast Cambridge area action plan and you can see the website address at the bottom there where you can find those details and then these are the details for the website, the email address and all the other details for you to be able to get in touch with us and if you want any paper copies of things as well please just drop us a line or give us a ring and we'll get them through to you. I've got a question that's actually just come up on the back of your management points Matt around, well if I suppose I should say a little handshake with the coming unitary, well it's obviously not a unitary on the table yet so we don't know that, would a parish council for the area be the right place to focus the management? I think it's a really interesting question about, we have a community forum that has been informing development in the area and that comprises representatives from the residents associations in the area and so forth and we are actually talking about what the legacy for that community forum might be going forward, as Matt says does it have a role in management and maintenance of the spaces, how do they get involved and we will see where that comes in, I don't know if Matt you want to add anything more to some of those sort of structural questions. Yeah I think initially I don't know that a parish council would be the right approach mainly because it will be a long time before we get to a state where actually we want to take it out of the developer's hands if you like and in that context I think it would be useful more so to have sort of the new community coming into the area to influence how they wish the area to be managed and maintained and having that dialogue with the developers upfront and with the surrounding communities as well, King's Hedges, which are well established and have good networks in terms of their residents associations and others being involved in a sort of committee sort of process really that has oversight over the management arrangements and works with the councils and with the developers to get it all right really and see how far we can get so we'll need to wait and see. There's a comment that Orchard Park shows that a parish council could be a good approach. Yeah yeah well we're taking the lessons learnt from all of the schemes around so we are learning from the what are the issues at Orchard Park and that tends to be around parking mainly and things like that and but certainly management of some of the spaces so we need to look at it holistically as well and just see what is the best approach whether that's a council-led, community-led or whether it's parish. The thing is it's certainly going to be one that again we would welcome your views on through the consultation because it is a long-term scheme and we do need to try and work with the community to find something that works for everybody in the area and not just what we think will be best so please please do respond to us on the consultation and do check out our website as well where there are a lot more FAQs and some videos and so forth as well. So thanks very much to everybody I hope there's been interesting and you've got some of the answers to some of the things that you're interested in. We will we will obviously be reading up on all of the responses we get through the consultation please respond between now and the 5th of October that is the deadline for responses we've got to get on with the plan and we've got to feedback on that to to yourselves as a community and also to the elected members and so forth and we really really value everything that comes in so thank you very much thank you also to all all the panel members and we'll be putting this up on our YouTube channel so if you have been watching anything any of your friends or neighbours or communities may be interested in watching it back you can check it out on our YouTube channel along with lots of other great content I do feel a little bit like a TV presenter but there you go and we'll see you at the next one soon.