Our Response to Capital & Centric's Development Plans in Huntingdon

Draft Huntingdon Development Plan by Capital & Centric: A response from the Cromwell Museum Trust

The Cromwell Museum Trust (CMT) has now had the opportunity to look at the draft proposals for development in Huntingdon as drafted by Capital & Centric (C&C) in partnership with Huntingdonshire District Council (HDC).

We broadly welcome any suggestions to improve Huntingdon and its infrastructure, particularly regarding the bus station which is need of improvement. However, we have severe concerns about the proposals that have been presented and cannot support them in their current form.

Regarding the proposals as set out online, via the circulated leaflet, and as presented at the public consultation held in Huntingdon on Monday 17 August, Trustees would raise the following concerns:

• Other than informal conversations at the public consultation meeting, we have not had contact from C&C regarding any potential projects. We would welcome the opportunity to meet with them directly to engage with them constructively.
• The Cromwell Museum has developed considerably in the last few years since becoming an independent trust, with a major refurbishment in 2019 which continues to attract visitors to the town. It is recognised nationally for the quality of its collections and work to promote the 17^th century to the wider public, ‘punching above its weight’ and promoting Huntingdon. We currently attract around 15,000 visitors a year, putting up to £500,000 a year back into the local economy. Many of these visitors come in by car, bus or by coach – the latter for visiting school parties and organised travel groups.
• At present we are engaged on a major capital project to expand the museum’s displays into a nearby building, 7/8 Market Hill. This has been purchased with grant funding from Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority (CPCA) and with support from Huntingdon Town Council (HTC) and HDC. This Grade II listed building has been vacant since 2019 and we are working to renovate it with our partners and transform it into a greatly expanded Cromwell Museum, creating a destination attraction for the town, as well as still utilising our existing historic building. This multi-million-pound development is expected to open around 2030-2031, providing a significant asset to the town, attracting many more visitors and helping regenerate the market square. It will provide facilities that benefit schools and community groups within the town and from further afield. We expect to double the number of current visitors at least and put back over £1million into the local economy per year.
• Museum visitors currently use several car parks in the town; part of the rationale for selecting 7/8 Market Hill as the focus of the museum expansion project was its proximity to a major medium stay car park that could service the needs of increased numbers of visitors, that being the Princes Street Car Park. This is currently the most well-used car park in terms of occupancy levels in the town, and we understand one of the most used in the district. It is invaluable not only in terms of its proximity to the new museum, but also its accessibility given that it is on level ground and there are multiple routes from there to get to key parts of the town – the High Street, Commemoration Hall, Library, and Council Offices as well as the Museum. Whilst we recognise that there is blue badge parking offered as part of the proposed scheme, we consider this insufficient, and it does not address the need for such a well-used parking area to be retained in such a key location. For the Museum, this would mean that visitors would have to park further away, having to navigate their way through the busy streets of Chequers Court from the Sainsbury’s car park or brave the traffic crossing from the small car park at Mill Common. The loss of the Princes Street Car Park will have a detrimental impact on the proposed Cromwell Museum Expansion, and local businesses more widely, particularly our partners at the Commemoration Hall who depend on the use of this car park for performers and audiences alike for their shows.
• Within this proposal the existing bus station would be completely removed and redeveloped for housing, to be replaced by three to five bus bays located alongside on the current ring road. Nobody denies that the bus station is in need of some form of redevelopment; however, it is well used by local people and regularly has five or six of the eight bays occupied at any one time, as well as two or three of the bus parking bays occupied by buses on layovers or parked coaches. The proposals as outlined by C&C would provide insufficient bus bays for existing bus services and no identified area for any bus or coach parking. Given that we get visitors who come to us by bus from surrounding towns and villages, we are concerned by the impact that this will have.
• Our particular concern is that we have many school groups who visit the Museum who come by coach; we also have group travel visitors who come as coach parties. Both currently use the bus station as a convenient and safe drop off point, and coaches then often park up there. Under the current proposals there seems to be no allowance for this, raising issues of safeguarding for groups of young people and easy access for coach parties who need level access given that many tend to be older visitors. As we are seeking to dramatically increase the number of these groups to a larger museum, we need to increase rather than reduce the existing capacity for coaches to drop off and park. Loss of proper coach drop-off facilities would be a major threat to the viability of the Cromwell Museum Expansion Project.
• Given that HDC and other authorities are championing greater use of public transport in order to reduce the area’s environmental footprint, as well as seeking to increase tourism through the local Tourism Strategy and the creation of the new Visitor Economy Partnership for the county, it seems counterproductive to substantially remove key transport hubs and parking. This would have negative impacts on key attractions for the town, and given the opportunities presented by the new Universal Studios development in Bedford to bring large numbers of tourists to the region, would be a backward step.

Regarding more widely the impact on the town:

• The planned removal of the bus station would result in the removal of the only public toilets in the town (other than the privately operated toilet in St Benedicts Court). This would lead to a significant loss of amenity for Huntingdon.
• The three bus stops on the proposed plan are on the right-hand side of the road, presumably as part of existing contraflow slip road, which would only suit those bus services coming in from Brampton Road into the town. Most services currently come into the bus station around the ring road, facing in the other direction, so would not be able to use these bus stops without disembarking passengers into the middle of the ring road. Bus stops could be put on the left-hand side, but this would necessitate having to put in a pelican crossing or similar at that point on the ring road. This would mean drivers would face traffic lights every two hundred yards along that stretch of the ring road between the Old Bridge and Brampton Road junction, which is impractical.
• The architecture proposed is very out of step with the character of the town, inappropriate for being the gateway into Huntingdon from the ring road and Mill Common access from the railway station. It is also right next to a conservation area. The designs are generic to anywhere in the UK rather than accentuating the character of our town. Buildings which complement existing historic properties (even replicating lost historic building facades as in many European cities and championed by Historic England’s High Street Heritage Action Zones initiative*) would create a more distinctive feel and sense of place for local people and visitors to Huntingdon alike. See https://historicengland.org.uk/services-skills/heritage-action-zones/regenerating-historic-high-streets/ for more details on this scheme.
• In addition to the style of architecture, the size of the buildings also provides great concern. Some proposed blocks of flats are four or five stories tall, considerably larger than any other buildings in the town (the comparison being the existing eyesore BT building) which tend to be no more than three stories tall. Allowing such taller buildings would be inappropriate for a small market town and set a dangerous precedent for other such projects in the town.
• In addition to the removal of a key town centre car park, none of the 79 flats proposed has any parking bays, which would put further pressure on the parking in Huntingdon.
• Whilst we applaud the building of more housing in the town at a time when there is a pressure on supply, these plans do not address local needs. The proposed development consists of high-end flats aimed at commuters, rather than providing affordable housing for local people and key workers. We therefore question how the project is in any way helping regenerate the town in a way that benefits existing residents.

We hope these points can be taken on board and as previously stated, would welcome the opportunity to be involved with further discussions and consultations as any projects develop.

As it stands however, the Board of the Cromwell Museum Trust cannot support these plans as they stand for the reasons stated above. We therefore add our weight to the substantial concerns about this project raised by our partners in Huntingdon and the wider community.  

Stuart Orme, Museum Curator, on behalf of the Trustees