The battle of ‘Owlstone Henge’: Cambridge resident could face fine if he doesn’t remove boulders declared ‘a nuisance’

Four decorative boulders placed outside a home in Newnham have been slapped with a council notice, warning the owners to remove them - or face a £2,500 fine.

The rocks, nicknamed ‘Owlstone Henge’ by residents, have been outside an address on Owlstone Road for several years.

They were put on a sharp bend by resident Nick Hurd to keep cars off the grassy verge and help slow down vehicles so pedestrians would stay safe on the unadopted road.

But last week Nick awoke to find the rocks had been wrapped in “environmental crime scene” tape and slapped with a council warning notice demanding the “owner of the boulders” remove them as they are causing a “nuisance.”

Nick says: “Having the rocks on the corner just makes people more aware that it’s a single track, so you can’t get two cars driving past each other down there. And secondly there are pedestrians on the track 90 per cent of the time when you come around the corner. It’s a very slow-moving space because we are pretty much a cul-de-sac and there’s no through traffic. We thought we were doing something for the benefit of the community, to protect people that aren’t aware of the situation, especially the number of tourists that we direct to Grantchester from there.

“We would like the council to explain whose land this is because we have always been told it was an unadopted road and so have taken responsibility for it until now. Everything was running absolutely smoothly before this and the stones were not doing any harm, just slowing people down a little. They are not on the track, they are on the grass verge. If we lose them and then a pedestrian gets hurt because of a stupid piece of legislation I would find that quite hard.

“I first saw the tape and the notice on the rocks when I came out of the house to pick up my wife from the station. I got out of my car and I was absolutely apoplectic! I was so shocked by it. And then quickly the community WhatsApp started kicking off about it, saying this is an absolute outrage. And since then, there’s just been a deluge of people coming to the door and saying, ‘Please don’t take them away. We like them and want them to remain there’.”

Cambridge City Council issued the Community Protection Warning under the Antisocial Behaviour and Policing Act 2014. It states that placing the boulders on the verge “is having a detrimental impact on the quality of lives in Cambridge” and “this conduct is believed to be unreasonable”.

Ward councillor Jean Glasberg (Green, Newnham) was mystified by the council’s actions, saying she had not been consulted and was unaware of any complaints from residents.

In the days since the warning notice appeared, more than 150 neighbours have signed a petition demanding the council keep the boulders in place to aid pedestrian safety.

The petition says: “We the undersigned do not agree that the stones on the verge of no 54 Owlstone Road have any detrimental impact on the quality of life of others in Cambridge. We believe that they add to the safety of the Owlstone track, which is a pedestrian route from Paradise LNR (local nature reserve) to Grantchester Meadows and is used by hundreds of people every day. We oppose their removal and ask for the warning to be withdrawn.”

Cllr Glasberg said: “The rocks have been there for several years now, and people think they are an attractive way to protect the verge and also slow down speeding vehicles on the track. It is an unadopted road, not a highway - it was a mud track for many years and was surfaced by the city council in 2001 as an environmental improvement to facilitate pedestrian access to the nature reserve.

“It was landscaped at the same time with more trees and shrubs planted on the existing verges, and the owners of the adjoining houses have looked after them. This is greatly appreciated by the community, and it is hard to believe that anyone has complained to the council about it.”

She has written to the council asking why the notice has been issued and calling for officers to scrap it.

A council spokesperson said: “On 16 July a Community Protection Warning (CPW) was served on a series of large rocks which have been placed on a strip of land by Owlstone Road, as they are restricting vehicular access, are of a permanent nature and are encroaching upon a roadway maintained by the city council. The CPW has been served to give reasonable opportunity for the owner of the rocks, which have been placed there without permission, to make arrangements to remove them. At the present time we cannot comment further as we are still collating responses to the CPW. We will review all of these following the expiry of the CPW on 13 August, and then we will consider the appropriate next steps. All correspondence that is received by the council will be considered as part of this review.”

Since the Cambridge independent went to print, the council has added in a statement: “The council received legal representation regarding rights of way along an unadopted road as there is an entitlement to a carriageway width of at least 20 feet, and boulders/rocks placed beside it infringe upon this.

“Legal action was threatened against the council, or persons responsible for placing boulders there, unless they were removed.

“A Community Protection Warning (CPW) was issued to seek to give the persons responsible for placing the boulders in their current location the opportunity to take remedial action to remove them. The council will consider all feedback received in relation to the CPW after it expires on 13 August.”

And they have apologised for using the “Envirocrime” tape, explaining: “ Some ‘Envirocrime’ tape was used by officers from our Environmental Crime team to affix the CPWs to the rocks – we apologise if the use of this tape gave anyone the wrong impression.”