Terminalia 2024: The Cherry Hinton-Fulbourn Interzone

I carried out a preliminary excursion a few days in advance of Terminalia. I wanted to check if there was any safe and legal route I could take from the Beech Woods to Fulbourn Road. The Beech Woods are immediately South of the Worts Causeway, a road which sits on the boundary of the City and South Cambs District, at the Southern extremity of Cherry Hinton City Council Ward. But this is well outside the 'village' of Cherry Hinton which is located the other side of the Lime Kiln Hill to the North. The Beech Woods mark the beginning of an area containing the Roman Road, Wandlebury Ring and the Gog Magog Hills.  I had not been to the woods for sometime. I was looking to find a particular feature, a carved tree with the face of an old man, possibly a wizard, set into its trunk.

A friend of mine had tipped me off about the tree. It had featured on the front cover of the first album by the local psych combo Psychic Lemon. The existence of the wizard-like face was confirmed on a forum dedicated to tree carving from several years ago. I had intended to start the walk from the tree, which seems to have some significance as a marker, signifying the threshold between the ends of the peripheral agricultural land between Lime Kiln Hill and Cherry Hinton in one direction and Fulbourn in the other, as well as the beginning of the Gog Magog Hills and Wandlebury Ring to the South East; an area associated with ancient burial mounds, hillforts and numerous myths and legends.  I imagined the carving in the tree as an avatar of Terminus and suitable place to begin a walk for Terminalia.

But I never found the tree, nor a pedestrian way across from the Beech Woods that joined them to Cherry Hinton. No paths with public right of way existed across the fields that separated the Beech Woods from Fulbourn Road and the Robin Hood pub. I knew it was possible to walk along the edge of a field up to the back of the chalk pits having done it it once before, unplanned. But the route was unofficial, and I couldn't quite work out where I had emerged from on that occasion, having come from the other direction on a walk during lockdown. The only other option was Lime Kiln Hill, which has no pedestrian footpaths alongside the road which is bendy and contains random fast cars. I made an attempt to walk up, but aborted when the rough grass verge ran out just as it approached a sharp bend. It seemed foolish to carry on. I reflected that they used to make us do cross country running here and I used to cycle up the hill with my mates often when I was probably at junior school without much worry. This made me feel a bit less intrepid and bold in my perambulation, but I quickly decided that psychogeography was best done based on the avoidance of known danger, rather than walking directly into it on purpose.

I abandoned the idea of starting my Terminalian drift at the Beech Woods and settled for a less ambitious and less hazardous walk beginning in the car park of the Robin Hood pub, located on the edge of Cherry Hinton 'village' and at the end of the Fulbourn Road.

On the morning of Terminalia, Friday 23rd February, I placed my foot into the depression in the stone that sits in the Robin Hood car park, now unceremoniously wedged between a post and a fence. The stone has existed in the car park for as long as I can recall. It is said variously to be glacial erratic, a base of a cross or post of some kind, a kingship stone and, most appropriately for today, a 'marching'  stone used by Romans. It is said that such stones were used by the Romans before setting off on a long march. Placing the foot in the depression at the beginning and end of a journey was said to bring good luck. 'pro itu et reditu'  ('For the journey, and the return') was apparently inscribed into such stones (but not this one as far as I could see). I wasn't planning a regimented march, or necessarily a return back to this spot, but the sentiment still seemed to fit. There was an element of the unknown ahead and setting the foot into the stone seemed an appropriate way to mark the start of the journey. The stone in its own way also marked a threshold to both Cherry Hinton village and into the pub. But I didn't cross the threshold into either.

Instead, I headed across Fulbourn Road and to the small 1970s housing estate based around two cul-de-sacs named Tweedale and Ainsdale. This area sits behind a row of brown council houses that date probably from the late 1930s that set back from the main Fulbourn Road. 'Tweedale' was the name I'd always associated with the whole area, although my actual associations with it were tenuous. The last time I could recall visiting the estate was the day of the Royal Wedding in 1981. There was a disco on a tent on a small green, they played the Specials and Madness.  But I couldn't place where the tent had been located, there seemed no suitable spot. I wondered if the event had actually taken place. Behind Tweedale is one of the fields that I was hoping to emerge from. But from this end it was confirmed that no obvious way into the field exists, even to get to the back of the Spinney which sits next to Tweedale. Instead, immediately behind the estate in 'the land West of Peterhouse Technology Park', a large new office or more likely lab space is being built overlooking the Tweedale residents car park.

I left Tweeddale and continued along Fulbourn Road, bordering the Southern extremity of Cherry Hinton. I passed the building now occupied by Cambridge Water on the North side. This was once the headquarters of Acorn computers, makers of the BBC B computer which proliferated in schools in a time before 'windows' or the internet. Acorn were part of the Cambridge Phenomena and in the early 1980s the building sat alone in its peripheral location. But now it has been engulfed by the Peterhouse Business Park next door, home of Arm, a company that Acorn morphed into in the 1990s.

Peterhouse College owns the land the business park sits on and has been a major land owner in the area for some time. St Thomas's Hospital also owns land in the area, notably to the North, where the residential areas bifurcated by Queen Edith's Way are located and which are linked  to the Beech Woods by Worts Causeway.  Queen Edith's way refers to Edith Swan-Neck, hand fast wife of King Harold, who owned the land in the Saxon period. Although it is thought the road was originally mistakenly named after the other Queen Edith, the wife of Edward the Confessor, who had no connection with the area at all.

I was tempted to have a meander around the business park but I could sense an atmosphere of 'not quite public' space about it, despite the apparently open access. Also it looked quite a dull prospect. Both aspects were mildly repellant and encouraged me to stay on the other side of the road. 

Almost immediately opposite I soon reached a significant threshold. The path pictured below below marks the border between the post war council Bridewell Road estate that sits at the end of Cherry Hinton proper. On the other side of the path, and the City administrative boundary, is the newer residential area that developed in the late 1980s and 1990s, creeping towards Fulbourn and administratively sits in South Cambs. This more recent residential zone sits at the edge of a peripheral space that exists between Fulbourn and Cherry Hinton. The two villages (Cherry Hinton is barely that these days) are being drawn ever closer together by increasing development and may become a single suburb in the fullness of time. At that point the peripheral zone between them will disappear into (imperfect) memory..

Marking this threshold from old to new Cherry Hinton was a green utilities box, featuring the Cambridge Heron, further out of town that I'd seen it before and with less of an air of 'official' street art about it than it has in most places these days. Accompanying it was a monkey face and the 'Poxy' tag, both of which seemed much more fitting with Cherry Hinton. The faces of the Heron and Monkey both faced East, towards Fulbourn as if they were pioneers, occupying frontier territory. 

A road sign showed the approach of the roundabout, the left turn leading into the peripheral zone and towards somewhere called Springstead Village, a place I had never heard of before.

Across the street a truncated bus stop stood more or less on the border, resembling an abandoned checkpoint. 

I looked back from the border path along the grassy barrier between the Bridewell Road Estate and Fulbourn Road. I couldn't remember it looking like this when I was a child, and in fact had no real memory of what it was like at all although I used to have friends on the Estate when I was growing up. In the other direction the grass continued but appeared more manicured and less 'common' like. Maybe the newer area on the South Cambs side sought to distance itself and present a more aspirational image. But I preferred the 'common' side to the tidier and golf course like Western counterpart.

I continued towards the roundabout, along the the shared cycle path which was devoid of people.

The left turn took me into Yarrow Road, which is one half of a sort of 'main' road that skirts around the edge of the periphery of  'New Cherry Hinton'. The streets in the residential area next to this half of the road all seem to be named after plants; Speedwell Close, and Teesal Way for example. No doubt a reference to things that grew in fields here before the houses were developed. On the other side was a manicured area of green behind a fence, which seemed devoid of such things although did have some trees.

Behind the trees the 'tower' of Fulbourn Hospital loomed up. This spectral sight was something I could see from my bedroom window when I was a child in Cherry Hinton. Sporadically a siren would go off at the hospital. It was believed by the children of  'Hinton  (and probably some of the adults) that the siren signalled the escape of a patient from the hospital. The siren and image of the tower were intertwined in my mind as symbolising something sinister happening in a place that seemed distant enough to feel strange but close enough to bring unease. Years later, when I was older, the myths of escapees was born out when my Dad discovered an old lady in our shed who seemed happy enough but obviously troubled. She had swapped her reasonably nice boots for my Dads old gardening shoes. The hospital confirmed she was 'one of theirs' when my Dad called to check and they came and gave her a lift back. Any ghostly and sinister connotations the tower had been forgotten by that point.  But as I walked past on Terminalia, probably 35 years later, the feeling partially returned.

The view of the hospital was soon replaced with the more mundane Tescos car park. This Tescos is referred to as Fulbourn Tescos although it is not really in Fulbourn. Its closest neighbour is the hospital and Capital Park behind it and the closest houses are just across the road in 'new' Cherry Hinton.

At the pedestrian threshold of Tescos car park was a chipboard advertising hoarding. This seemed unofficial and contained adverts for fringe businesses. On offer today were mattresses, on a sign that seems to occasionally spring up on the lamp posts of Cambridge, and a landscaping service that was 'working in your area'.  The notice was another avatar of Terminus, this one marking the threshold into a world of golf course style landscaped shopping mundanity. I did not cross.

The railway line separates the two halves of the road, marking the point where Yarrow Road turns into   'Gazelle Way'. The grey fence marked a threshold, not just one of changing road names but a more sorrowful one. Flowers and soft toys were placed at various points, up against and hanging from the grey spiky fences next to the railway crossing, among the police warning signs and one for the samaritans. Before the development of Tescos and 'new' Cherry Hinton, the railway crossing was slightly nearer the hospital and featured a telephone where the distressed could call for help. But it wasn't always used. The proximity to the hospital of the crossing and the siren were of course connected. The flowery shrines confirmed that the crossing still took some people to the 'other side'.  

The location of the crossing was named 'Cherry Hinton By Pass' which seemed ominously  pertinent.

I did not cross the threshold into Gazelle Way at this point, but took the path leading along the railway towards the hospital and Fulbourn beyond that. I passed another shrine, a white bear sitting on top of a concrete sewage marker post with flowers on its head. A mournful avatar of Terminus. 

Through the trees I could see the 'spire' of Tescos. They all have them, but due to its proximity this one reminded me of the tower nearby. The building appeared sinister and institutional from this angle.

I emerged into the grassy grounds of the hospital and followed a barely visible 'desire' path through some posts.

This lead me to a small collection of gravestones. Three of them close to each other.

The end two 'belonged' to particular people. The middle one to a multitude of former patients of the hospital buried in the cemetery from 1862 to 1955. The memorial stone marks the site of the former chapel. 

There was another newer lone gravestone standing next to the fence at the boundary of the site, a few feet away.

After loitering among the graves for a few minutes, I moved on, leaving the zone of memorials and the interface between life and death.

A section of wall, presumably a remnant of a larger one that used to surround the Victorian asylum, was festooned with street art/graffiti. The difference between the two is often marginal. That the wall is never cleaned indicated the art work was at least semi-official.  The wall seemed a bit out of place, as if  part of a more urban or suburban environment had somehow materialised into the space from somewhere else. The wall was an early adopter, an indicator of the development to come that will most likely see an increasing suburbanisation and filling in of the Cherry Hinton/Fulbourn interzone. The green face a symbol of both the interzone itself and the change to come, another avatar of Terminus.

 

The path turned into a road, Fulbourn Old Drift, split by the railway.  Since the reconfiguration of the crossing,  the original course of the road from Cherry Hinton to Fulbourn had been disrupted. Previously, the railway crossing had split the otherwise continuous  road which joined up Cherry Hinton with Fulbourn. The hospital at the time seemed very much within the Fulbourn side of the border, even though it existed its own space somewhere in between both villages.

Now the 'drift' had been split and disputed. It was no longer possible to cross at this point and each side was effectively a dead end. The path I had just come along the only route between both sides of Fulbourn Old Drift. A new block of flats or maybe offices stood near this point, signifying the gradual infilling between the places the border had previously kept apart much more clearly.   

As I walked up the hill in the direction of Fulbourn, the land separating me from the railway line consisted of a wide area that resembled a nature reserve. Except that the signage on the gate  made it clear access was not permitted. It would have been quite an easy bunk over the gate, even for me, but I resisted the urge. I suspect others have been less restrained.

A bus stop on the hill seemed a bit out of place. The 'name' attributed to it, 'Rising Bollards' seemed even stranger. There were no rising bollards in the vicinity that I could see. Although I suppose I was rising up the hill. This got me wondering who is responsible for naming bus stops and in this case had a rogue prankster somehow managed to evade whatever bureaucracy is normally involved, ensuring that the normal conventions were bypassed unnoticed.

The view from the hill showed that there is still sufficient countryside between Cherry Hinton/Cambridge and Fulbourn for both to be separate. But I wondered how long this state of affairs would last.

I was distracted from dwelling on the likelihood of both places eventually joining up by a car that had seemingly been abandoned in a field to my right. The car resembled a Vauxhall Astra, not that new and looked stuck in the mud. I assumed it had been stolen and abandoned there. But on my return up the hill about 20 minutes later, the driver was talking to a man in a truck who had come to tow him out. He must have been sitting in the car all along, cursing his satellite navigation device for giving him premature directions to turn right.

On my decent, the scrubby nature reserve/railway land to my left began to change and soon it was clear a new development was taking place. This was adjacent to and partly on the site of the Ida Darwin hospital. The view of diggers and workmen through the bushes was replaced with hoardings which presumably doubled up as security fences. These confirmed that the development was for 'an exclusive collection of luxury 2,3,4 and 5 bedroom homes'. Further down, in a zone where the remaining parts of the Ida Darwin and a marketing suite and car park for the development seemed to intermingle, the offer was reiterated and the name of the development revealed. 'The Orchards' were depicted in a computer mock up of lawn, road and houses. The image was not one I could not easily reconcile with the growing of apples.

After returning up the Hill, past the driver and his rescuers, I diverted into the grounds of Fulbourn Hospital. This is now known as 'Capital Park', or at least some of it is. There certainly did not seem to be any particular dividing line between the newer buildings that housed mostly scientific industries and the old victorian asylum building and later single storey 1930s looking prefab type buildings. The latter at least are still used for patients. The main building is at least in part NHS and UK Health Protection Agency Offices and retained an air of  the 'institutional'. The Tower closer up seemed smaller but was still imposing.

 

I wandered through the grounds, following the 'main' road that emerged onto Fulbourn Road. On one side of the entrance a tall modern looking sign advertised 'Camlife. Capital park Cambridge' and ' and and Innovation Focussed Environment'. On the other side was the Victorian Gatehouse, which mimicked the tower like a younger sibling.

 

The entrance to the sight was a threshold between two worlds, signified by these boundary markers that stood opposite each other. But somehow 21st century life sciences and Victorian asylum seemed to compliment each other and represent nodes on the same continuum. The methods employed in the asylum would probably have been new and experimental when it was founded-although its hard not to think of gruesome images of Bedlam when passing the imposing Tower. In the 1960s the hospital was recognised for its pioneering therapeutic community. The main difference between these temporal zones was probably symbolised by the new name. Capital Park indicates a shift something  less social and more business orientated than the more public and benevolent sounding 'asylum' or 'hospital'.

Just inside the gate, off the main route a sign offered tour booking for Cambridge Grove Tertiary Care Home.   A little further inside 'Capital park' was a sculpture of the DNA double helix symbolic of life, set among leafy green spinach like plants. This conjunction seemed to mark a threshold from the prime of life to the tertiary  stage. A similar helix sculptures can be seen on the DNA cycle path between Addenbrokes Hospital and Shelford, another village on the edge of Cambridge, not far South of Fulbourn. Another has recently appeared at the new Franklin Gardens Barret Housing development on the edge of Northern Cambridge, opposite Orchard Park and next to one if a pair of terminal pylons in the vicinity.  

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Back near to where I first entered the hospital/Capital Park grounds, the way out was marked by a signed for the 'TESCO Path'. I supposed the name was logical given that the path led to a Tesco but it was by far the only destination. I suppose Tesco may have sponsored the path or had some responsibility for its upkeep. Nonetheless, I was disturbed at the idea of public byways and passages been corporately branded. How long before the Tins is rebranded 'Sainsburys path' or Vera's Way' is renamed 'Asda Way'? A future where all paths are branded such, in a similar way to music venues or football stadiums, seemed an all too likely dystopian prospect as I navigated my way through.

 

Just at the threshold of the hospital grounds was a notice reminiscent of the work of Barmy Art. But not up to his usual standard. I wondered if he had been visiting when unwell or if it was just a poor imitation by an imposter. The message was even more cryptic than usual.

 

Back at the railway crossing, I crossed to the other side where a power station and terminal pylon stood. This power station was one I passed as a child on occasion, the first one I had seen in real life and around about the time of the famous TV public information films where kites get accidently flown into pylons and frisbees into power stations, resulting in death and injury. The adverts and this site have been intertwined in my mind ever since. As far as I know, no kite of frisby episodes ever  actually took place here. But during power cuts in Cherry Hinton in the 1970s and 1980s there were often rumours of cats  entering the station and accidently getting electrocuted and causing the outages. 

The road alongside the power station led back to where the original railway crossing and telephone used to be, just past a mobile home site. The mobile home site used to be owned and run by the mum of a boy I was at school with. She lived in a bungalow on the site and had a frightening  black dog on a long chain. To my young mind it resembled  Zoltan Hound of Dracula or Black Shuck and was a creature not to be trifled with. I'd seen the hammer film 'Zoltan' on Horror Double Bill and had read of Black Shuck, probably in one of those Usbourne 'world of the unknown' books that were  prevalent at the time. Now the caravans that used to be on the site had been replaced with posher looking park homes and there was no sign of a black dog. But the place still had a strange liminal feel about it. The location at the end of the road,  now completely a dead end with grey spiky fences, piles of leaves and a utility box of some kind with the view of the hospital beyond, enhanced this feeling.

I retraced my steps and crossed over Yarrow Road onto what used to be a continuation of the road I was just on. Here the path and fence now blocked cars continuing along Fulbourn Old Drift. This was another boundary/barrier that had been inserted onto this road, interrupting the old continuous link between Fulbourn and Cherry Hinton. There are other 'drifts' not far away, or were. Long Drift  and Trumpington Drift  are now Cherry Hinton Road and Queen Edith's Way. These roads existed in agricultural landscape prior to the inclosure in 1810. The word 'drift' brought to mind long slow meandering along the track, unhindered by cars, joggers and other forms of modern busyness. But Fulbourn Old Drift now offered a more disrupted and built up journey. 

 

The bungalows along this stretch used to feel much more cut off and peripheral than they did as I approached. I recalled the scene as something like what might be out in the fens, the only street in a far flung hamlet in the periphery of Ely or March. But now it felt a bit more like a continuation of Cherry Hinton. Although not quite. One building contained a largish car park and was clearly not entirely (or possibly at all) residential. It was unclear what went on there. 

The bungalows gave way to the newer 1970s council estate and opposite my former Junior School. In the early 1980's it was known as the Cherry Hinton Community Junior School. Now it's branded 'Berwick Bridge Community Primary School'. Berwick Bridge was a vicar of the parish and fellow of Peterhouse College.  The school had to change it's name when it and the infants school on the high street both became 'primary' schools. The children were given the task of finding a new name, based on history and geography of the area. Berwick Bridge was chosen, due to the obvious connections. Another suggestion  was 'Fizzy Pop School', but although the governing body were 'delighted' by this idea it was discarded. I wondered if the suggestion was a reference to the provision of fizzy drinks and other junk food in vending machines in schools. A phenomena that hadn't materialised when I was at the school. The Vicarage up the road, meanwhile, has been demolished and the site developed for housing.

I took the path alongside the school, which separated it from a green area which was part of the the 'New Cherry Hinton', on the Gazelle Way side of the railway line. Gazelle Way contains the estate, beyond which agricultural land separate it from the village of Teversham. I realised I had never walked down this path of into the estate, at least as far as I could recall, despite it's existence since probably the 1990s. The green area to my right has been a farmers field , which separated the school from the electricity sub-station and caravan park beyond, and was part of the borderlands between Cherry Hinton and Fulbourn. Now it felt more amorphous and fluid. Although there was still a boundary feel, it was much less defined and more of a continuation than a sudden stop.

I saw few people as I passed through various passages, cul de sacs and bits of green that made up the estate. An unoccupied bench summed up the feel of the place, with the view beyond towards Teversham. The extensive municipal green area puzzlingly unused, was a reminder that not so long ago, green space provision on new build estates was much more generous than it seems to be now. I enjoyed a respite from the walk on the bench for ten minutes,  enjoying the expanse of the space in solitude. I saw no other people. Time stood still as I rested and rehydrated. 

I reached Gazelle Way and followed it North towards the outskirts of Cherry Hinton High Street, where it becomes Airport Way. The road felt very much a border. Beyond the hedge, the field the other side did not belong to Cherry Hinton. Not yet anyway.

Across Airport way a new development was in progress. This was 'Springstead Village', the place referred to on the yellow sign I'd seen earlier. The first phase of new development around or on Marshalls Airfield. Marshalls are due to vacate the  Airfield in the coming years after which it will be fully developed for housing as 'Cambridge East'.

Marketing boards proliferated near the marketing suite. 'Be a part of Cambridge's newest quarter'. 'Scale, Vision, Legacy' and 'Creating a vibrant new destination in Cambridge '. Cherry Hinton was not mentioned,  perhaps a confirmation that it has been fully swallowed up into Cambridge not worthy of consideration by marketeers.  'Cambridge' is presumably more sellable. 'Destination' seemed a bit of a stretch. Shops and facilities like schools are apparently going to be provided, but what will attract  people not living there to visit from far and wide was unexplained.

Access to the walkways between the houses was limited due to ongoing development. I took the path around the water feature. This was similar to those seen at other new developments like Marleigh. An apparent trench dug and filled with water to make a rectangular sort of mini lake/large pond. Presumably deep enough to drown in given the lifebuoy located alongside.

 

The name Springstead Village was presumably entirely derived by marketing exectutives. There is no spring here. No natural watercourse passes anywhere nearby. The spring in Cherry Hinton at the Giants Grave is at the other end of the high street, opposite the Robin Hood where I started the walk. 'Village' is I suppose estate agent talk for 'housing estate' in this context. But who knows, maybe the aspiration to create a 'village' atmosphere might come off. This seemed a challenge given the scale of planned scale of the aforementioned Cambridge East, a development which will rival the Kings Hedges estate in the North of the city in terms of scale.

After a wander around the artificial water feature, I took leave of the estate. I realised that I had come full semi circle, through the outlying Western edge of Cherry Hinton and the  Fulbourn borderland. I noted that Springfield village straddled over the Country Parish boundary into South Cambs, Northwards, extending the reach of Cherry Hinton and by extension Cambridge. The border itself seemed temporary. The administrative boundary, which presently cuts diagonally across the airfield. would surely have to be redrawn. This seemed a natural end to the walk. The ancient Giants Grave and foot stone where I started the walk seemed a world away. The walk had taken me across a temporal boundary into the near future, and to a conjunction of boundaries both administrative and physical. 

As I was about to leave the same friend who had alerted me to the carved face in the Beechwoods and the Psychic Lemon connection called. He lived nearby, close to the Cherry Hinton/Fulbourn border. I wandered with him back through the Gazelle Way estate and into the older council estate that I used to walk through to get to Community Junior School. The estate was how I remembered, a larger version of the one we lived in across the railway line, with more passages and random green spaces to explore. Though the walls were beige, it was not the same beige at that found in modern estates. The houses seemed somehow more human. I put this down to the fact they and the streets around them had been lived in for around 50 years. They had been properly worn in and unusual human touches could be found in randoms spots.

At the back of the estate a passage runs between Cherry Hinton High Street and the railway crossing near the big Tesco I had passed earlier. Fences separate the path from back gardens on one side and the railway line and its surrounding scrubland on the other. Across the fence I could see the smaller estate I grew up in. 

We headed to the High Street and the point where the path meets the site where the Green Hut stood until recently. One of the last features that came from a time when Chery Hinton was still recognisable as a village had been demolished some months earlier. The building had been left to decay and had stood empty for some time, the ghosts of jumble sales, club meetings, nursery classes and 1980s mod revival discos almost tangible in its fabric. It was being replaced with what looked like some raised beds and features that indicated the coming of a community garden, or possibly one that would be enclosed within the site of the infants school. Either way,  with even the smallest parcel of land being snatched up for 'development opportunities' throughout the city, this was a more welcome sight than what I had imagined might have been. The long standing liminal space was moving into a new phase, crossing the temporal boundary to an uncertain near future.

Elizabeth Way Roundabout: Brutality on the Eastern Gate

At the fag end of 2023 the current Housing Secretary, Michael Gove, announced the formation of a new Development Corporation to oversee the expansion of Cambridge and the building of 'northwards' of 150,000 homes. This dwarves the figure of 50,000 previously identified in the Greater Cambridge Local Plan. Gove promised to reveal more about how the water supply issues  would be dealt with later. Given that the Conservatives are almost certain to finally be given the heave ho by the electorate later this year, it seems more than likely that this 'vision' won't pan out quite as advertised. But Gove's plans are not entirely new and seem like an on-steroids extension of existing ones. Whatever happens, Cambridge is set to see significant expansion and development at an ever increasing pace. Gove's 'vision'  is 'for a new urban quarter – one adjacent to the existing city – with beautiful Neo-classical buildings, rich parkland, concert halls and museums providing homes for thousands....  accompanied by further, ambitious, development around and in the city to liberate its potential with tens of thousands of new homes'.   A seemingly intentionally vaguely defined idea combining faux-Victoriana and Silicon Valley sprawl, with the sole purpose being the expansion of the life science and tech economy. That's what the statement brought to my mind anyway.

We will have to wait and see exactly the future city will look and feel like. But development has been gathering pace for some time. There are a number of proposals and plans already in motion that were dreamt up long  before Gove came up with the plan for a 'Development Corporation'. A term which harks back to the utopian idealism of the New Town period. However, unlike that period, things like council housing, civic centres, public art, community,  essential infrastructure and services are not things that look like they are high on the agenda.

While it was easy to be skeptical about Gove's announcement, it gave me the kick up the arse I needed to think about documenting some of the places currently marked for development before they are altered beyond recognition or disappear altogether.

The first site I decided to visit and the destination of the  first official walk of the year, was Elizabeth Way Roundabout. This is located at an entry point to the city centre and the central feature of what has been termed the 'Eastern Gate', an area more likely known to locals as 'the town end of Newmarket Road'. The City Council's Eastern Gate 'supplementary planning document' (SPD), which looks to have been produced around 2011, gives a good overview of the area and has some good maps. But crucially, it shows that over ten years ago plans were already afoot to transform the area. It calls Elizabeth way Roundabout and its underpasses,  'unpleasant and hostile'. Later its says the roundabout 'lacks the qualities of a positive gateway into the city and severely limits pedestrian and cycle movements'. Part of the strategy suggested was to remove the underpasses and remodel the junction. More recently plans to do just that have been consulted on as part of wider development plan called the 'Eastern Access Project'. The Eastern Access Project covers the length of  Newmarket Road to East Barnwell, where significant plans have just been proposed. It seems likely that the Elizabeth Way roundabout underpass will be filled in, with the  surface remodeled into a 'dutch' style roundabout with surface cycle lanes and pedestrian crossings.

The roundabout and Elizabeth Way Bridge, which extends Northwards from the roundabout to cross the river, is an unusual site (and sight)  for Cambridge in its concrete enormity. Cambridge is a bit low on underpasses and 60s/70s brutalist concrete structures of any kind. It is probably because of this that I have a possibly irrational fondness for the roundabout and it's underpass. When I was a kid, I remember having a perception that other towns and cities were made up of underpasses, black tar stained railway bridges, scuffy back alleys, caffs and brutalist concrete offices, flats and road systems. I remember sometimes having the feeling that I was not living in a proper city because Cambridge lacked these things and I was missing out.  My perception was no doubt based on a combination of things I'd seen from the car window when going on holiday with my parents and television programmes from the late 70s and early 80s set in urban environments, like Grange Hill and The Sweeney.  So for me at least, the roundabout is a site of significant psychogeographic interest. It was difficult to get a photograph that does it justice due to it's size.

I headed down to the underpass from the South West side. Graffiti is a perennial feature of the routes leading in at all four corners. Every now and then, it is whitewashed. But the graffiti soon returns. The standard of graffiti has been getting increasingly poor generally, and most was not worth photographing.

But the first of several Nigels of the day greeted me as continued into the underpass. A deluxe Nigel in purple. 'Nigel' seems to colonise many of the peripheral spaces around Cambridge. The Eastern Gate was a zone in transition and in a liminal phase, waiting for something to happen, as the proliferation of Nigel's in the area made clear.

As well as graffiti, the four underpass 'tunnels' all contain official murals, each with its own theme. These had previously been kept pretty clear of graffiti, due to a protective coating making it easier to clean anything off. But the cleaning seems to have halted. I wondered if this was a sign that the city council had stopped bothering, on the assumption that it wasn't worth it given that the underpass was probably going to disappear in the not too distant future. But I'd also noticed a lack of graffiti removal elsewhere in the city so it could just be down to the council being short of money.

This section of the underpass contained the Technology, Science and History' themed  mural. Being  the entrance/exit pointing pointing to/from the part of town containing most of the colleges and University, this sort of made sense, given that Cambridge's Science and Tech economy originates from the University and companies that span off from it as 'The Cambridge Phenomena'. The Cambridge Phenomena began in the 50s, and now is the driver behind Gove's plans. Of course before that, the University has long been associated with science, back at least as far as  Newton being hit on the head by an apple.

 

 

I arrived at the open sunken courtyard. That doesn't feel like quite the right word, sounding a bit too old fashioned and stuffy for something resembling a sight you would expect to see in downtown Stevenage or Harlow. I don't really know what the right description for this type of feature is, but on entering the open space, once the science mural was forgotten, there was no obvious connection with the University or anything else people usually associate with Cambridge.  Rather, the feeling was of having arrived in a place that was once a vision of modernism that was never quite realised, very much like contemporary Stevenage or Harlow. This disconnect is, I think, one of the main justifications given  for removal of the underpasses and roundabout.  But the environment found here is a symbol of escape from the sometimes overpowering sanitisation  of other parts of Cambridge. It is somewhere where you could imagine seeing Roland Browning stuffing his face with chips while bunking off school. Its a place out of time and space.  Not one that was ever likely to be turned into a heritage feature for the delight of tourists on an official guided walk. 

It was again difficult to get a good photo that fitted it all in. But while I was writing this and doing a bit of googling about the roundabout, I came across the excellent 'Coleridge and Beyond' blog which contained a recent post about the roundabout. It contains photos much better than mine and further information about the roundabout and its murals.

I emerged on the North West side, next to National Tyres which has been there for as long as I remember, but I have a recollection of the logo being in black and white. Beyond this part of a new development, at least one newer than the Eastern gate SPD, came into view.

I followed the path that runs down the side of Elizabeth Bridge towards the river, alongside the development which was on my left. These blocks appear to be student flats. It wasn't made clear if they were any particular sort of students. No signs of a particular college or even the University were evident. The gate I passed was coupled with a residents only sign giving no further clue. I had hoped to cut through the development to investigate further but clearly the public were not welcome.

The other side of the path, there is  space beneath the bridge beyond a brown door, which looks like it has not been opened for some time. In the past there were calls to use the space under the bridge as a music venue, among other things. I imagine its mostly been used for storage as it has, to the best of my knowledge, never been opened to the public.

Further along part of the space is being used as a 'hidden' homeless shelter. This was revealed by the Cambridge News in a surprisingly coherent article. It highlights clearly the contrast between those living in the 'luxury'' student accomodation and those in the shelter. A stark microcosm of Cambridge being one of the most unequal cities in the country, with the student and 'luxury' flats in the new development offering views across the river and Midsummer Common and looking down (literally) on those having to exist in the shelter. 

I stumbled across a desire path heading in the direction of the new development, which from this angle looked not unlike three brick and glass made cruise ships poised to sail across the Common. I supposed the design might have been intended to produce associations with luxury and wealth. The ones with the biggest windows are presumably the most expensive ones.

The desire path led to an official path, which then took me to a gate which the public were allowed through, as long as they were following the 'permissive path' as signified by the green label on the gatepost. The gatepost was otherwise uninteresting and non-descript, save for sign that confirmed the development was called 'Riverside'. I always referred to the area the other side of Elizabeth Bridge that followed the road along to Stourbridge Common as 'Riverside' and wondered if this naming, as well as being a bit unimaginative, would cause confusion.

The development was large but fairly featureless, other than a strange pice of landscaping that resembled a mini amphitheatre, with a sort of abstract (or maybe just unidentifiable) metal public art piece at the centre. Well, more private than public, but it is not alway easy to tell until an officious security guard appears. Thankfully there did not seem to be any around. Here I guess its more a private/public-permissive space. Its probably not permitted to walk on the grass though.

Another piece of art appeared at the end of the route which comes out into Newmarket Road. A depiction of a skeleton belonging to a large aquatic dinosaur ran along a wall. The wall had an air of the temporary about it, but I could not be sure whether that was just a feature of its modern design. Behind the wall, the building that was once the Bird in Hand pub loomed up. More recently it had been an upmarket indian restaurant, but that has relocated across the road, leaving the building empty. The Bird in Hand was one of the few pubs in the vicinity of the 'Eastern Gate' memorable in my lifetime. No doubt there used to be more. My nanna always told me that there were many more pubs along East Road when she was growing up, whilst also reminding me that people didn't have the money to go to the pub 'in her day'. This seemed paradoxical. These days there seems to be an inverse relationship between the amount of affluence (and people) moving into the city and the number of pubs, which also seems paradoxical. So maybe what she said was less contradictory than it seemed at the time.

The building below is on the site of what used to the to be the offices of the Cambridge Evening News, before the paper relocated to the outskirts at Milton, just across the A14 and lost the 'evening' from it's name. The road next to the building is called Evening Court, as if the paper left the 'evening' behind on leaving as a reminder of it's past as a quality local rag. I can't recall exactly what the old building looked like, it has faded from memory,  but I think the site must have covered the area behind where the houses are now. Somewhere around here, probably on what is now the Riverside development, was a part of  Cambridge Regional College that used to train people to be chefs and hairdressers and where the public could go for a cheap meal and  haircut. I think these activities might still go on at the CRC Campus on the edge of town near the Science Park. 

Now next to Evening Court, the building that replaced the Cambridge Evening News offices houses the Cambridge Building Society Headquarters. It is unusual such an institution retaining its premises in town these days. With the Cambridge News, Cambridgeshire County Council and South Cambs District Council having moved out of town, and talk of even the Police station moving out, it feels like the people of Cambridge are being abandoned by an exodus of  public serving institutions as they move to cheaper sites in a bid for efficiency savings.

Across the road building previously known as Shakespeare House was being renovated and will be rebranded 'Generator'. The previous building was a probably from the 1980s or 1990s so not ancient. Although it had been unremarkable looking enough for me to have trouble remembering what it had looked like before and I had to look it up. Like the buildings that runs along Sun Street next to it, there hadn't been much to notice about it. The new version looks from the intranet computer mock ups a similar prospect, just a more modern version.

Heading back to the roundabout I mooched along Sun Street, which is less of a street and more of a layby. A good portion of this is taken up by another brown office building from the 1980s or 1990s called  Dukes Court. Currently it appeared empty and up for lease. At number 6 the letterbox was taped up and the notice board blank.

I retraced my steps under the roundabout and headed back between the luxury flats and homeless shelter until I reached the underpass beneath Elizabeth Bridge. The view towards the river between two large concrete supports was accompanied by the rumble of cars passing above.

I lingered under the bridge for a while, and looked up to see a number of cobweb covered lights. These appeared to have been untouched for years. There were no concessions to gentile aesthtics here. The huge concrete posts, ancient looking cobwebs and relentless vibrations of the traffic passing overhead and the metal barrier running beside the river created a waterside experience diametrically opposed to that to be found further along the Cam in both directions within the city boundary. An experience not to be repeated until well out of the City boundary along the river path under the A14 near Horningsea. The environment under the bridge was akin to something from a J G Ballard novel. There were no straw hatted men passing on punts here or tourists gathering on the riverside having picnics. Nobody stopped here, just passed through. I began to feel self conscious loitering as cyclists and joggers passed me as I photographed the cobwebs, which in this space occupied a similar position to the gargoyles and grotesques found carved into college walls, just with less people pointing their phones at them.

I left the scene and came out the other side of the bridge. I turned into Abbey Road to head back up to the roundabout. The street is mainly residential victorian terrace but at the corner of Beach Road is the Abbey House, a 17th century built of the site of the old Barnwell Priory, reputably the site of several hauntings. But I passed this by fairly quickly, distracted by the weathervane on top of the hairdressers at the end of the street. This seemed to symbolise the divide East and West in Cambridge. West pointing into the City and University. East meanwhile, was going out of town to East Barnwell, the most deprived part of Cambridge and also a part due to be redeveloped as part of the Eastern Access Project. That's a blog for another day but suffice to say anything currently existing on Council owned land in the centre of East Barnwell is up for change, while the drive through Macdonald's will remain unaffected.

 

I arrived  at the North East entrance to the underpass beneath the roundabout. I was greeted by another deluxe Nigel.

Instead of descending, I decided to head East along Newmarket Road  as the weathervane had directed.  I observed the traffic passing by the ex-Rose and Crown pub. The brown 1930s pub building exterior is intact, with the rose and crown symbols incorporated into the brickwork, along side the Greene King figure above the door. The interior of the building is now the offices of a property letting agency. It stands  almost opposite the old Bird In Hand pub building across the other side of the roundabout, which I had passed earlier. Both closed pubs appeared portents of potential blandness to come if the Eastern Gate fails to deliver anything more than the filling in of the roundabout, some cycle lanes and the erection of more bland 21st century residential buildings and office space.

On my side of the road, the North side,  it was clear things were being allowed to become run down in advance of development. The South side had already seen quite a bit of development and reflected a likely future state. I walked past a sign on a board around a site about to be brought into this Eastern Gate future. It stated stated 'Building your visions, creating reality' alongside an uninspiring computer generated photo of what was presumably to come. Underneath was a Nigel with a backwards question mark added to the end, perhaps expressing both confusion and  distain about what was coming.

A faded circus poster occupied position above the cracked pavement outside number 129, a premises that must have recently been something but I had no recollection what. The word 'Fun' in large letters had probably once been bright red but was now false teeth gum pink. I don't think 'fun' was a word or sentiment found in the Eastern Gate SPD, nor in Michael Gove's vision for an expanded Cambridge. I couldn't even recall noticing its more corporate counterpart, 'leisure', being much of a feature either. It did say something about there being several pubs in the area. Several is stretching it a bit, even if you count the closed ones.

The Cambridge Odd Fellows District Office, along with Casey House, was one of the few buildings on this stretch not in a state of pre-development dilapidation.

Across the road, I could see the building that replaced the old Five Bells pub and is now occupied by the game studio of Ninja Theory Limited, a company that make computer games and were recently acquired by Microsoft. On the ground floor of the building is the Bird and Worm, which operates as a pub but appears closed at the weekend. I heard somewhere that originally it was just intended for the workers of Ninja Theory, so presumably envisaged as a sort of social club. But does open to the public, although perhaps grudgingly. I've never seen much advertising on social media.

A bit further along is one of the few buildings on the South side that has survived the beige spreadsheet architecture invasion that has taken place there over the last few years. Cambridge Refrigeration Technology has occupied the  purpose built premises since 1962 and has its originated from the The Low Temperature Research Station formed in the University in 1937. So part of the Cambridge Phenomena and a place of research and development, while paradoxically having the appearance of something resisting the  development that phenomena is currently perpetuating.

Back on the North Side, the site previously occupied by the Veritas Further Education College, Logic House, was in a state of advancing decay. Profuse wild vegetation sprang from the walls and graffiti had developed within the open space behind the fenced off wall. The 'access in constant use' sign spoke from an earlier age. It looked like nobody had been in for months, possibly years. Its days were undoubtedly numbered.

Likewise, the former newsagents which used to be a well stocked and busy establishment. A large deluxe Nigel brightened up the whitewashed windows and signified this temporary stage in the life of the building before its inevitable demolition and redevelopment. 

Further along, I was amazed to see the former Coopers building was (just) still standing. The faded lettering and distinctive blue tiling were, I thought, things I was probably seeing for the last time. Last I heard an Easy Hotel was due to be built on the site to compliment the Travelodge and Premier Inn across the road, but its taking a while to materialise. I'm not sure if the delay is caused by the developer knocking down the adjacent Victorian house. Apparently it was to be kept and incorporated into the new hotel as part of the approved plans.

Nigel had colonised the site, twice, this time with Tape and some cryptic symbols. Maybe these were protective and there to ward off the coming of the Easy Hotel  and the encroachment of more bland development.

They were not pointing hard enough to have prevented the new 'Anglia House' student building next door presenting messages on garish boards covering the windows. 'Take a peak to begin your extraordinary journey with us' was a phrase I was having trouble reconciling with student accomodation. Surely students go there to sleep and eat, not to set of on some kind of 'journey'. But then I ruminated on the proliferation of the nauseous expression 'customer journey' that is used by the corporate world to describe even the most basic and mundane transaction or service activity.

The nearest pub in the Eastern Gate area closest to the roundabout and actually still open is the Corner House. Up until a few years back live music happened here but now its all pub and food. Maybe its survival is in part due to people from Anglia House making a 'journey' across the road. One not very far in distance but one leading to a destination most likely miles apart in atmosphere and environment.

Just beyond the pub is a large Tescos, on the site of the old Gasworks. In front is an area with a war memorial where people wait for the bus. The Tescos car park is extensive, but has paths along each side and around the back that led to the river and the Technology Museum at the old pumping station. This is just beyond the periphery of the 'Eastern Gate' but I had hoped I might get a pint at the outside bar that Calverley's Brewery have in pumping station grounds.

Alas, it was not to be because they were closed, I was too early. I came back the other side of Tescos along Cheddars Lane. 'I almost died here' was one of the messages delivered by the graffiti infested wall on the edge of a light industrial area. I wondered whether to take this literally or if it was meant as a comment reflecting the general state of the area in which I stood 

I carried on back to Newmarket Road, past a white crumbly MOT garage on one side and the Wrestlers pub on the other. The Wrestlers is another brown 1930s pub building, which would have served the Gas Works. These days it does decent Thai food and served Charles Wells beer.

I crossed over to the South side on Newmarket Road. Here, between the Pizza Hut on the edge of the retail park and Coldhams Lane, were several sites in a state of flux, pending development.

One vacated building contained a more faded circus poster than the one spotted earlier.  The word 'fun' had disappeared completely. The colours had washed out leaving only cold blue, the warmth and joy expressed by the bright colours of the original version completely erased. 

It was not all gloom though. Directly across the road, the Seven Stars Indian Gastropub offered both curry and beer under one roof. I have only managed to get there to try their wares on one occasion about a year ago and very much enjoyed it. 

In a previous life, The Seven Stars was not encased by residential buildings with grey plague windows. The flats above, to the right side and to the rear are a relatively recent phenomena, dating from 2018/19. The building to the left obviously a bit more ancient, and typical of the remaining residential  buildings along the road between here and the Roundabout. The frontage of the original pub that closed in 2012 remains, despite a serious fire that broke out in 2014. At the time the building was being used as living accomodation. After the fire the building was left empty and boarded up for sometime, but the facade, which I think had to stay as a requirement planning permission, managed not to fall down. Before the 2012 closure, the pub was known as a bikers pub, and before that frequented by an older crowd. My mum used to regularly go there in probably the mid nineties or early 2000s  and went on pub outings to places like Blackpool. My only memory of going there in my youth was a brief stop on a pub crawl. Me and my friends found ourselves engulfed in a middle aged karaoke so drank up swiftly and left.

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Back on the South side of the road, I approached the site where a Premier Inn now stands. This spot had previously been occupied by a black glass building which had stood for sometime on the corner of Newmarket Road and Coldhams Lane.

 

 

Just before this, behind the Majestic wine Warehouse site, another new building was going up. I couldn't recall if the glass building had also occupied previously this site or if something else had. What was coming next was ground floor retail/office space with, presumably, flats above. I wondered at the possibilities the retail space might afford, and wss not optimistic. The building did not look like one designed for the provision of fun. But hopefully something more interesting than a Costa Coffee or an estate agents will materialise on the ground floor.

 

I turned off at Coldhams Lane to follow the back of the Travelodge on Harvest Way, which appropriately features some allotments sandwiched between the Travelodge and New Street.

It only took a short time to get along Harvest way, which is essentially a service road for the back of the Travelodge and other new buildings along the stretch of Newmarket Road that runs parallel. I don't recall seeing much of interest, The street was one of back doors and tradesmans entrances. I emerged at the junction where York Street, New Street and the short street leading to the pedestrian crossing over Newmarket road and the Bird and Worm meet. I took a diversion down the latter and noticed a profusion of shopping trolleys left at the base of one of the the residential block. 

Back at the junction, the two large advertising boards that are usually well maintained had become infested with poor quality graffiti. Advertisers had given up entirely on one of the boards, which resembled a modern art nightmare of ripped paper and despondency. Nigel watched over the scene from a nearby green telecoms box. The small blue advert between the boards promised 'boutique living', presumably in the beige block behind. Images of the flats inside being lined with psychedelic wallpaper, clothes rails, lava lamps, hammond organ music and 'groovy' people briefly flitted through my mind, as if someone had just put on an early 70s library soundtrack album. I quickly came to my senses and realised the reality inside would be more in keeping with the exterior of the building and with probably much less space than the place that had briefly manifested in my head.

Further along New Street I looked for the old blue Lacon's Rodney Stores building. This had disappeared since the sojourn I documented here where I first noticed it. I hadn't noticed the subsequent disappearance until now. It's replacement was another typically 21st century building, presumably containing flats. Next door, part of Mackay's still existed. The Metal Warehouse's metal shutter contained some half hearted graffiti. Mackay's have recently announced they will be relocating out of town, which will free up space that will presumably become inhabited by similar buildings to the one on the right.

Further along another part of Mackay's backway featured another metal shutter, this time with a Nigel which was unchanged since my previous perambulation in search of the 'mythical' Gas Lane back in 2017.

I head back down Occupation Road, which these days is lined with student accomodation on the left hand side and flats or possibly student accommodation on the other, until emerging atbthe Rose and Crown and the roundabout.

Occupation road was previously more reminiscent of the old back of Mackay's in my memory, and somewhere that raves used to happen in the 1990s prior to redevelopment.

From this side it was still not possible to photograph the roundabout in full. 

I descended and wandered into the underpass featuring the mural dedicated to Stourbridge Fair. Thie fair was apparently a ribald affair and the mural paid homage to this with scenes of drunkenness among the market stalls and juggling entertainers. The sort of debauchery depicted is probably about as far from the ethos of the Eastern Gate SPD as it's possible to get.

I took one last look across the space under the roundabout in the direction of National Tyres before I departed. I'm sure it won't be the last time I pass through the underpass before it is filled in, but by the time I get around to documenting it again it may well be gone, faded into the memory and imagination of the collective psych of Cambridge.

The graffiti on the way back up to East Road I think summarised this and the residence of the roundabout in my mind pretty well. 'Everything you see now is part of your imagination'.  A much better and more positive way of looking at the loss of places previously taken for granted than becoming mired in 'nostalgia' for things past. Elizabeth Way Roundabout may represent part of a lost future of 70s Newtown utopianism that was never to be in Britain and is a hauntological landmark in Cambridge. But with its dissapearance will come another era. The forthcoming buildings may seem bland now, but maybe one day as they themselves are about to be removed for whatever comes next, they will be regarded similarly to the way I regard the roundabout. They might be documented by somebody who has lived with them for decades and regards them as an intrinsic to the psychogeographic fabric of the City, hard to imagine as that might be now.