Protect the Greenbelt
Our local free amphitheatre for watching
the silent regional manoeuvring of clouds,
the molten kinetics of sunsets,.
dew’s disappearance after dawn …,
for hearing
the arrival of long distance breezes
and for sizing up the sky.
(photo and words from David Yandell. Photo taken from Snout’s Corner. Just next to where the access to the sewage works will be constructed).
From Wednesday 25th August edition of the Cambridge Independent.
New Cambridge sewage works set to look like ‘giant pastry cutter’, say campaigners
Here is the official response from the Save Honey Hill group to the Phase Two consultation of the Cambridge Waste Water Treatment Plant Relocation proposal (CWWTPR). The response has been sent to Anglian Water and they have confirmed receipt.
The consultation ends tomorrow, but it’s not too late to add feedback. Even if you have submitted a response using Anglian Water’s form, they will still accept emails and letters. Anglian Water have confirmed these will be counted and accepted. Their interactive map will also be accepting comments and “likes” up until the end of tomorrow. It only takes a few minutes to go like comments you agree with. It only takes a few minutes more to enter comments about various parts of the proposal.
Now that Anglian Water have selected Honey Hill to be the site for their new sewage works they are consulting on mitigation measures to make this industrial site fit nicely in between the villages of Horningsea and Fen Ditton. They have even asked if we want a visitors centre for people to be welcomed to the sewage works… NO!!!
There is little time left to Have Your Say as the Phase 2 Consultation will end on the 18th of August.
It is extremely important that as many residents as possible have their say. Without feedback they will count their pennies and mitigation measures will be minimal! The Save Honey Hill group have written some suggestions for filling in the questionnaire if you need some help on our website. You will find a direct link to the consultation form there.
Here’s the official response from the Save Honey Hill group.
Please do respond to the CWWTPR Phase Two Consultation:
In the Cambridge Independent today:
If you haven’t yet done the consultation then here are some suggestions from the Save Honey Hill campaign.
The United Nations Heritage body have said that years of development have caused ‘irreversible loss’ to historic value of Liverpool’s Victorian docks. So Liverpool’s much valued world heritage status, which it gained in 2004, has now been stripped.
This an awful blow to such a lovely city. But it is a warning that Cambridge and similar historic and treasured cities should heed.
Cambridge is facing many massive development projects within and around the city. From large scale developments such as the train station development that has been rightly condemmed as “an embarrassment to the city”, to small quirky historic pubs like the much loved Flying Pig pub that is to be demolished for office blocks, to the upcoming NECAAP development on track to become the neighbourhood with the highest density of housing in Europe. It seems developers are free to profit from piling concrete block on concrete block and our city suffers.
Still at least Anglian Water will be building a Discovery Centre so that people can view the sewage works they are placing on greenbelt land.
Cambridge deserves better.
If you think the UK’s water companies can be trusted to manage greenbelt and protect chalk streams and drinking water aquifers from pollution, then read this report from the Environment Agency published last year on pollution incidents from water companies (Anglian Water and Thames Water were responsible for over 50% of such incidents).
Then read how Southern Water have just been fined £90 million for years of deliberately disposing of billions of litres of raw untreated sewage into the sea off the North Kent and Hampshire coastlines, to avoid paying costs of upgrading infrastructure.
He said the company had a history of criminal activity for its “previous and persistent pollution of the environment”. It had 168 previous offences and cautions but had ignored these and not altered its behaviour. “There is no evidence the company took any notice of the penalties imposed or the remarks of the courts. Its offending simply continued,” he said.
Finally why not look at DEFRA’s Magic Maps website that shows the risk of groundwater contamination below where Anglian Water are intending to relocate the Sewage Works.
Worried?
In the Cambridge Waste Water Treatment Plant Relocation (CWWTPR) phase 2 consultation, Anglian Water have put many graphics of how they envisage their “iron age fort” sewage works will look and be located. However, they have not put a straightforward map of just how large the plant will be in comparison with the villages of Horningsea and Fen Ditton.
Here is a simple map, constructed using Anglian Water’s own maps for reference and Google Maps for the locations of roads and villages.
The existing plant is also shown, using the information given in the CWWTPR Phase one documents.
When asked to pen a few lines about Honey Hill and what it meant to me I could not think of what to write other than it is beautiful and it would be a crime to desecrate it with the proposed, unneeded and unwanted sewage works… but everyone knows that. Everyone, that is, apart from the faceless ones determined to railroad it through.
On consideration, however I realise that Honey Hill has been known to me for many years and, in the course of horse riding, walking, jogging and cycling, plays a significant part in my life and I have many fond memories of it.
I moved to Fen Ditton in 1986 and first set eyes on Honey Hill on Boxing Day of that year when I was taken there by a well-known local character called “Barry the Horse”, (sadly no longer with us).
We stood near the Pink House and watched the local hunt gallop past in full cry and, whatever your views on hunting, seeing horses and hounds at full gallop in close proximity is a sight that cannot fail to stir the blood.
Since that day I have been a regular visitor to the area, even at one time, keeping a horse in the now disused, but rather pretty, hedged meadow on the left as you approach the Pink House from Fen Ditton.
The Pink House, I am assuming, was a crossing keeper’s cottage when the Honey Hill to Snouts Corner track was a vehicular road. There are the overgrown remains of another such crossing keepers cottage at the railway’s junction with another former road further towards Lode.
Most of my memories of Honey Hill area are equine related and I recall riding towards Snouts Corner when we saw in the distance a Harrier Jump jet rise into the sky in a vertical take-off, (which I knew they could do), and then, spectacularly, fly backwards (which I didn’t).
For several years I kept two horses at some old farm stables, (now Francis Court), in High Ditch Road, Fen Ditton and our daily hack out would be towards Honey Hill either turning right onto the railway track at the Pink House or carrying on towards Horningsea.
One frequently bumps into other horse riders or walkers also enjoying the peaceful haven Honey Hill offers together with frequent sightings of wildlife including foxes and deer all within sight of Cambridge’s urban sprawl.
Another well known character frequently encountered around Honey Hill until fairly recently was “cool hand luke”, a kindly eccentric who rode a stocky dun horse and dressed as an american civil war confederate soldier complete with stetson, six gun and sabre. His horse could be frequently be seen tethered outside various pubs in Fen Ditton, Horningsea and Quy!
The proposed sewage works is not needed -it is merely being relocated to facilitate building tract housing at Milton. The proposed desecration of this area, in the green belt and in defiance of all the mores of planning, conservation, ecology and traffic, is a crime, plain and simple.
It will deprive not only local people of a rural haven in a rapidly urbanising area but adversely impact the lives of the many people who will come to live in the area in the many years to come. Years which we may not live to see.
Once Honey Hill is gone, it will be gone forever.
Nick Dakin
Anglian Water has chosen Honey Hill to build its new sewage works, including at least two digester towers of 26m and taking 22 hectares of prime green belt land*, the size of 30 football pitches1 ! The stage 2 consultation begins on the 23rd of June until the 18th August. This will be our best chance to give official feedback to Anglian Water.
We need to be clear that the Phase 2 Consultation is primarily about mitigation. The Save Honey Hill Campaign will continue to fight the relocation but for now this consultation is about having your say regarding issues such as positioning, traffic, lighting (at night), noise pollution, odour, design, screening, impact on wildlife and environment and so much more.
Watch for a leaflet from Anglian Water through your door. They will likely be addressed to ’The Occupier’ so don’t mistake them as unsolicited marketing and be tempted to put them straight in the recycling bin. We will do our best to publicise any forthcoming public meetings in a timely manner on social media and via email.
..and if you want to be kept updated on the campaign, then subscribe to our Friends of Save Honey Hill newsletter.
