Alternative to Cambridge South East Transport ‘would cost £100m less than busway’

An alternative has been presented to the Cambridge South East Transport (CSET) busway that advocates claim would be £100million cheaper and less environmentally destructive.

Cambridge Past, Present and Future says an on-road bus scheme along the A1307 corridor would offer “similar transport benefits” and cost less.

A petition signed by 4,873 signatories was presented to the Greater Cambridge Partnership’s joint assembly by James Littlewood, chief executive of Cambridge PPF.

It called for the GCP to “choose a better solution”.

The GCP has said it cannot take forward all of its schemes, because of spiralling inflation, and CSET and Foxton Travel Hub were found to have ticked fewer boxes when analysed against a host of criteria.

Rising construction costs mean its forecast expenditure on approved projects has increased by more than £200m. While the GCP’s expected income has also increased, the gap between its forecast income and its estimated expenditure is £278m.

Sawston resident Steven Partridge-Hicks asked, now that the GCP had decided to pause progress on CSET, how much money it was expecting to spend to progress it to the stage where a Transport and Works Act order would be ready to go. He suggested “at least an equivalent amount” should be spent on exploring alternative, cheaper proposals – namely the 2017-18 proposals for a bus lane on the A1307 and spur road into Addenbrooke’s, which would cost about £100m less than CSET.

“This alternative doesn't require a Transport and Works Act order, it could be delivered so much more quickly for the benefit of the travelling public and all employers alike,” he said.

Mr Littlewood, speaking on behalf of the trustees of the Hobson’s Conduit, said there was concern over the impact of CSET on Nine Wells local nature reserve and Hobson’s Brook chalk stream, including the 15m concrete deck from the intrusive proposed bridge over the brook that would create a “sterile, dark cavern”.

Water voles and grey partridges would be impacted by CSET and drainage arrangements would bring salt from de-icing to “pollute the pristine chalk stream”, he warned.

The alternative scheme was favoured by the trustees, he said, as it would not impact Nine Wells while delivering “similar transport benefits”. It “would not involve building three massive concrete bridges, with huge embedded CO2 over Hobson’s Brook and the River Granta” and would not impact water quality or habitats.

The GCP was asked why it was not considering the scheme.

A full Environmental Impact Assessment on the CSET scheme will be published in the coming days, said the GCP transport director Peter Blake, adding that reasons why alternatives have not been explored have been “previously discussed”.

Cllr Katie Thornburrow said the impact pausing the project could have on the Cambridge Biomedical Campus needed to be considered.

She said there were “known transport and movement issues” at the campus that needed to be resolved.

“If there is a delay to CSET that needs to be taken into account, so that as the biomedical campus builds out it is in the best possible place for moving around the campus and taking into account the number of people coming by the train,” she said.

Cllr Sam Davies, who was speaking in her role as a Cambridge City Council member, said pausing the scheme could cause Cambridge South station to make the situation at the biomedical campus “worse”.

She said without CSET anyone who wanted to use the station outbound would have to drive or find another means of accessing the site.

Cllr Davies asked officers when they last revised their forecasts of the number of trips to the campus in the period to 2031.

“We haven’t revised the forecasts,” said Mr Blake in response.

Writing on her blog after the meeting, Cllr Davies claimed the GCP was treating the public with “barely concealed contempt”.

She said: “Now, maybe I provided an easy way out for officers because of the way I phrased things. It allowed a brief negative response.

“End of discussion, even when prompted by the chair to expand the answer.”

She continued: “Surely any organisation which feels even the smallest sense of obligation to serve residents and work with them, as opposed to playing games and stitching them up, would elaborate by volunteering some information about when and how they were going to revise the forecasts. Or even just indicate some understanding of why a councillor might ask such a question on behalf of their residents?

“That appears to be an unreasonable expectation of the GCP.”

Mr Blake said later: “The delay of CSET does not impact [Cambridge South station] because CSET was always coming after the station, but there are conversations going on as to how we deal with Cambridge South. We are in conversation with county colleagues and Combined Authority colleagues as to what that looks like.”

Mr Blake said he saw the “attraction” of wanting to see smaller projects if the main project was paused, however he highlighted these smaller projects would still have to go through the various stages required when putting together a scheme.

He also said the growth at the Cambridge Biomedical Campus showed that “significant intervention” was needed, and that the CSET project was itself needed.

Mr Blake said a pause would give time for the GCP to try and find and secure other funding for the project.

Dr Kristin-Anne Rutter, executive director of Cambridge University Health Partners, which oversees Cambridge Biomedical Campus, welcomed the prioritisation of options before the joint assembly.

“It’s good that we think about our financial viability,” she said.

The CSET busway is an important scheme to both the Biomedical Campus and Granta Park, she added, and hoped the “first port of call was to seek alternative funding”, rather than allowing the scheme to be dropped.

Rachel Stopard, chief executive of the GCP, said she would be happy to provide an update on the search for alternative funding for CSET at the assembly’s November meeting.

A spokesperson for the GCP said after the meeting: “We understand that Cllr Davies has an understandably keen interest in the impact of the Cambridge Biomedical Campus on her community in Queen Edith’s – indeed at her request, GCP officers have previously attended community forums in the ward on these issues. Her question at the GCP joint assembly was predicated on a suggestion that revised trip forecasts had been produced for access to the site. A Transport Needs Review for the Cambridge Biomedical Campus site was developed and published in March 2019, as the first full appraisal of the transport requirements of the site undertaken. This review included trip forecasts for the site and transport requirements to 2031 and also contained a list of projects required to best serve the site.

“This study was updated in 2022 and looked at the delivery of schemes, notably Cambridge South Station and the CAM Metro, and the impact on the campus site. The work did not revise trip forecasts for the site as per the question. We are sorry Cllr Davies felt slighted during the assembly, this was not the intention in providing our answer to her as we always hope to answer public and councillor questions as directly as possible given the time many put into asking a question and the value they place on the information they receive.

“We would be happy to discuss this matter further with Cllr Davies and will contact her in due course.”

A final decision on whether to pause the two projects is expected to be made by the GCP board on September 28.