St Matthew’s Piece Trees (Again)

Under threat… Again!

Another guest post from Valerie Neal, a Friend of St Matthew’s Piece
Aerial image of St Matthew’s Piece showing, on the western edge, the three trees, subject of this planning application.
The three trees under threat

🌳🌳🌳 THE THREAT

An insurance claim at 193 Sturton Street (a new-build approx 25 year old property) blames clay shrinkage subsidence on three 125-year-old trees. A planning application has been submitted for the felling of these three trees.


🌳🌳🌳 PLEASE HELP FIGHT THIS  

Objections from members of the public are urgently needed. Objections must be submitted as ‘Comments’ via Planning Application 23/0119/TTPO on the Greater Cambridge Shared Planning Portal. (Requires registration.)

Objections would be most helpful by Monday 20th February, but will be accepted after that date.

Scroll down for possible grounds to use in your objection.


🌳🌳🌳 THE ESSENTIAL BACKGROUND

Last summer, Cambridge City Council’s Planning Committee refused permission for these three precious trees to be severely cut back in both height and spread. The harm to the trees was judged not to be justified by the evidence. More information was required. (More here in this earlier post: St Matthew’s Piece Trees – Under Threat. Especially useful are the soil moisture deficit graphs.)

Instead: the applicant has now submitted a new application (23/0119/TTPO) to fell the three trees (or to install a ‘root barrier’ along part of Sturton Street). Their scanty documents fail to address even the reasons for refusal last summer. 

However, this time, the applicant has also given a bit of information on an alternative to felling or pruning, namely a ‘root barrier’. They have shown one aerial photo for the possible location of a root barrier and obtained one quote for the cost of delivering this. See pp. 10-11 of the applicant’s Addendum Report On A Subsidence Claim Arboricultural Recommendations under the ‘Documents’ tab for 23/0119/TTPO on the Planning Portal.


🌳🌳🌳 SUGGESTED GROUNDS FOR OBJECTION

Everybody will have good reasons of their own, but here are some suggestions from the Friends of St Matthew’s Piece:

  1. The only official park in the Petersfield ward is St Matthew’s Piece, compared to 56 official parks in Cambridge’s 13 other wards.
  2. Petersfield has a particularly poor tree canopy, with very few mature trees.
  3. All trees matter in Petersfield, which suffers badly from the ‘Urban Heat Island Effect’.
  4. Each of these 125-year-old Plane Trees has a Tree Preservation Order (TPO), and is in our Conservation Area.
  5. Changes to a Conservation Area require public benefit to outweigh public harm – but there would be zero public benefit from felling these three trees, only massive public harm.
  6. These trees are vital to the wellbeing of every person who lives, works or studies in our community.
  7. The applicant has not shown what harm now exists at the property… and completely failed to demonstrate how the “slight” cracks previously reported are due to the trees – rather than poor foundations, shoddy construction or “thermal movement” in the modern brickwork.
  8. If the applicant is convinced that the trees are harming the property, then the Planning Committee could permit them to install a good-quality root barrier, if done without significantly harming the trees.
  9. The applicant (or owner of the property) must pay for the root barrier. Due diligence required them to take into account trees that had been present for 100 years before this property was constructed.
  10. BS5837:1991 (applicable at the time of construction of 193 Sturton Street) described the then British Standards on trees and construction.
  11. The relevant National House Building Council standards document (section 4.2 Building near trees 4.2.7 Foundations in shrinkable soils) is illustrated below.
    Note the NHBC advice: Root barriers are not an acceptable alternative to the guidance given.
  12. The majority of the ‘Standard References’  listed on p.12 of the applicant’s Addendum Report On A Subsidence Claim Arboricultural Recommendations were already published before the construction of 193 Sturton Street, so should have been taken into account.
  13. Felling these trees would breach Cambridge Local Plan (2018) Policies 14, 23, 55, 56, 61, 67 & 71 as well as National Planning Policy Framework ¶91abc, ¶92abc and ¶96, as outlined in greater detail in the parallel Objection prepared by Friends of St Matthew’s Piece.
  14. In 2006, 2007 & 2008, the City Council’s own tree expert repeatedly stressed (in connection with Planning Application 06/0567/FUL Erection of a community innovation centre (refused) the importance of preserving all the trees of St Matthew’s Piece, both individually and as a group – and these trees have only grown in importance since then.
Extract from National House Building Council standards document
4.2 Building near trees
4.2.7 Foundations in shrinkable soils
The sentence: "Root barriers are not an acceptable alternative to the guidance given." is highlighted by the present author.
Click the image to read the National House Building Council standards document section
4.2 Building near trees
4.2.7 Foundations in shrinkable soils

🌳🌳🌳 FURTHER BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Objection to 22/0271/TTPO – from Friends of St Matthew’s Piece
22 March 2022
(Report against the planning application stopped in July 2022)

Trees of St Matthew’s Piece and Appendix II Input from Heritage Advisors (Both from the report against a planning application stopped in March 2021.)

2.5 minute video on what that threat had been 

🌳🌳🌳 FOR THE FUTURE

To be kept up to date, please email Friends of St Matthew’s Piece, and ask to be added to the Friends of St Matthew’s Piece Supporter’s List. You will be led through a data-collection-compliant sign-up process. This will make sure you receive very occasional email updates on issues like this one.


Local residents have been fighting to protect and conserve local amenity and environmental assets via Friends of St Matthew’s Piece since 30thApril 2020 – and, before that, via Petersfield Area Community Trust, since 1998). We stand on the shoulders of the giants who, 100 years earlier, in 1898 had established St Matthew’s Piece. This included planting the magnificent London Plane trees that provide all of us with such wonderful benefits today. Read more on the history of St Matthew’s Piece, on the St Matthew’s Piece Timeline 1890–2020.

Grafton Centre Redevelopment – consultation

Photo of existing Grafton Centre main entrance on Fitzroy Street
Existing Grafton Centre main entrance on Fitzroy Street
Click the image to visit the Grafton Consultation website

Trinity Investment Management (not connected to Trinity College) acquired the Grafton Centre in 2022, and are now consulting on changes to the centre that keeps a smaller number of shops, retains the gym and cinema, but converts much of the building into laboratories for science research.

The proposals include:

  • Reducing the number of shops to reflect the growing number of empty units at the centre – but retaining some retail and leisure, including the cinema and gym, alongside improved public spaces around the centre
  • Improving the connectivity for cyclists and pedestrians, restoring some of the historic connections that were blocked when the Grafton Centre was built
  • Repurposing as much of the existing structure as possible – to limit disruption to neighbours and minimise the amount of carbon-intensive demolition and construction
  • Delivering much-needed research space for promising science start-ups – a sector which is growing and needs more lab space across the city

Trinity Investment Management
Find out more by visiting the Grafton Consultation website.

Online webinar

Trinity Investment Management are holding an online webinar over Zoom where the project team will talk through the proposals and answer questions.

Date: Thursday 24th November 2022
Time: 6:30-7:30pm

You can join the webinar using this link.
Questions may be submitted in advance by email to contact@graftoncentreconsultation.co.uk, or during the meeting using the Zoom chat function.

​You may also use the developers’ Feedback Form, or contact them by phone on 07771 323980, or email contact@graftoncentreconsultation.co.uk.

Aerial view Masterplan with retail marked in green and the cinema marked in pink
Masterplan with retail marked in green and the cinema marked in pink
Click the image to visit the Grafton Consultation website

Whilst this post is open for comments, and readers are welcome to debate the issues around the proposed development, this does not guarantee thatTrinity Investment Management will be able to engage with them on this platform.

Beehive Centre – Redevelopment

Public exhibition and digital consultation

Image of leaflet, headed:
THE BEEHIVE CENTRE PUBLIC EXHIBITION & DIGITAL CONSULTATION
With aerial view of location
More text:
Railpen would like to invite you to a public exhibition and digital consultation on our updated proposals for the redevelopment of The Beehive Centre.
Click the image above to view/download a 2-page PDF with full details.

The Beehive Centre is adjacent to Sturton Town to the north of Mill Road on the Petersfield (city) side of the railway.


Find out more about Victorian Cambridge & the Building of Sturton Town.
Find out more about the old Beehive Pub, on the corner of Ainsworth Street.


In June 2022 we held our first stage consultation on our proposals for The Beehive Centre at which we outlined our principles for development and asked for the local communities input to create a scheme that brings social value and tangible benefits to the local area and Cambridge.

The consultation was well attended and we heard and captured a wealth of insights and ideas from local people about what you value about The Beehive Centre today, and what you would like to see in the future. This feedback has informed our updated proposals which we are ready to show you at our upcoming consultation.

We strive to work with the people of Cambridge to reimagine a key strategic site, embracing sustainable and inclusive design through a vision to the creation of a new local centre with accessible, green and useable spaces to strengthen Cambridge’s status at the forefront of the science, technology and innovation sector.

four communications on behalf of Railpen

Public exhibition

Thursday 24th November – 2:30pm to 6:30pm
Friday 25th November – 2:30pm to 7:30pm
St Barnabas Centre, (Old Schoolroom) St Barnabas Church, Mill Road, Cambridge CB1 2BD
No prior booking required.

Digital consultation

The digital consultation webinar will take place on Wednesday 23rd November – 6:00pm to 7:00pm

To register your interest for the digital consultation, the QR code on the PDF can be captured with your smartphone/tablet. Otherwise it resolves to: https://qrcodes.pro/nPGeLI.

If you are unable to attend either consultation nor the public exhibition but want to learn more you can email thebeehivecentre@fourcommunications.com or phone 01223 960001.


Many of you will be aware that Railpen, who invest the Railways Pension Schemes’ assets, will be redeveloping the Travis Perkins site adjacent to Devonshire Road for long-term tenanted residential accommodation, and that, whilst this has been broadly welcomed by the community, some of the details of Rail Pen’s initial plans were felt to be in need of improvement. Of course, this is an entirely different project to the Beehive Centre, but we’ve referenced it to give context on Rail Pen.


Whilst this post is open for comments, and readers are welcome to debate the issues around the proposed development, this does not guarantee that four communications or Railpen will be able to engage with them on this platform.

Maths School on Mill Road?

Eastern Learning Alliance intends to open a new free school, Cambridge Maths School, a specialist sixth form centre catering for students across the whole of East Anglia.

This would be in the former premises of the Regent Language School, 119 Mill Road, Cambridge CB1 2AZ, at the western foot of Mill Road bridge.

Unfortunately, this came to our attention only recently, and well after the public consultation event on Wednesday 22nd June, at the Old School Hall, St Barnabas Church, Mill Road, Cambridge, CB1 2BD. We are, however, in time to inform you about the Section 10 Statutory Consultation, which ends on 29th July 2022.

Cambridge Maths School
Section 10
Statutory Consultation Summer 2022
Consultation ends 29th July
Click the image above to read/download the 6-page PDF

The Cambridge Maths School is set to open in September 2023 under the Eastern Learning Alliance, a Multi Academy Trust that is currently comprised of Impington Village College, Chesterton Community College, Witchford Village College, Downham Market Academy, The Cavendish School and Girton Glebe Primary School.

An initial site for the school has been identified on Mill Road in the centre of Cambridge. This is a repurposed language school, with science labs added to the already well-established school. The school will be open to 80 students across years 12 and 13.

It is the intention to eventually secure a larger site for the school to allow for up to 200 students. This site will also be in central Cambridge with similar excellent transport connections. Details will be made available as soon as a suitable site has been secured.

Cambridge Maths School consultation PDF

Mill Road Bridges sees advantages in new specialist facilities for sixth form students, however, there would cause for concern if parents were to be ferrying students to and from the Maths School by car. Whether or not new traffic restrictions are introduced on Mill Road bridge, an additional (say) 40 car movements in and out of the restricted access to this site, would amount to 160 additional vehicle movements each school day.

The academy trust refers to “excellent transport connections” and says:

Because CMS is a sixth form school, students will travel to the school in the same way they would be expected to travel to any other post- sixteen provision they would otherwise choose to attend. The location of the school provides excellent transport links for students travelling to the CMS from across the whole of East Anglia, being only 5 minutes from the Cambridge Station, and so students and staff will be expected to travel by public transport, cycling or walking and will not add any traffic to the area.

Cambridge Maths School consultation PDF
Note that the trust says “students and staff will be expected to travel by public transport, cycling or walking”. This is far from being an assurance that this expectation will be written into staff contracts, nor into the school rules for students.

You can respond to this consultation online, here. Note that the questions are identical to those in the PDF which you can read/download, above.

In the view of Mill Road Bridges, the most important section is the box: If you have any other comments or queries, please list them here. The online box appears to be able to expand to take an extended narrative comment.

You are also welcome to comment (politely) below. Yes, we are aware that an Education Minister recently gave a middle finger gesture to a crowd. We will not permit the equivalent on this website.

Please also note that any comments made here will not necessarily be seen by the Eastern Learning Alliance.

St Matthew’s Piece Trees – Under Threat

A guest post from Valerie Neal, a Friend of St Matthew’s Piece

Local residents have been fighting to protect and conserve local amenity and environmental assets via Friends of St Matthew’s Piece since 30thApril 2020 – and, before that, via Petersfield Area Community Trust, since 1998). We stand on the shoulders of the giants who, 100 years earlier, in 1898 had established St Matthew’s Piece. This included planting the magnificent London Plane trees that provide all of us with such wonderful benefits today. Read more on the history of St Matthew’s Piece, on the St Matthew’s Piece Timeline 1890–2020.



Trees in Petersfield 

Consider how poor is the tree cover generally in the surrounding area. Our little St Matthew’s Piece is Petersfield’s only official park (versus the 56 parks in the other 13 Cambridge wards; see the 2018 Cambridge Local Plan’s Appendix C). Petersfield  is poorly provided for not only with regard to Public Open Space but also when it comes to tree canopy, number of trees, and tree coverage. All of this while Petersfield has the most densely housed population in Cambridge, living in properties that are predominantly very small houses or flats (with little or no private gardens; see p24 of the most recent Friends of St Matthew’s Piece submission to the Planning Portal).

Friends of St Matthew’s Piece are not the only ones to have noticed. A recent (late 2021) pan-European study included Cambridge in its review of 1000 cities – Green space and mortality in European cities: a health impact assessment study [The Lancet, VOLUME 5, ISSUE 10, E718-E730, OCTOBER 01, 2021]. This revealed that 68% of Cambridge residents do not have the WHO-recommended access to green space. 

These 68% are, naturally, not evenly distributed across Cambridge. The Environment ‘Domain’ of the latest iteration of the Government’s Index of Multiple Deprivation reveals that the area around St Matthew’s Piece falls into the 2nd most deprived of 10 deciles nationally, with regard to this parameter.

All of the splendid mature trees around the (now, tragically, privatised – in 2018) northern half of St Matthew’s Piece have continued to thrive, thanks to the twin protections of Tree Preservation Order No 4/2005 and their location within the Mill Road Conservation Area (1993). The benefits are mutual: these trees are themselves vital to the Mill Road Conservation Area. Check Tree Preservation Orders on the Cambridge City Council website here.

But that does not mean these precious trees are safe. 

A New Threat 

On 15th March, a scant week before the 22nd March deadline set by Greater Cambridge Shared Planning for the submission of comments, Friends of St Matthew’s Piece learned by chance of the ‘tree application’

22/0271/TTPO | T1, T2 & T3: London Plane – Reduce height by ~5m and spread by ~4m balancing crown of all three trees. Prune on a triennial cycle to maintain broadly at reduced dimensions. | St Matthews Centre And St Matthews Piece Sturton Street Cambridge Cambridgeshire CB1 2QF

This proposed a brutal cutting back of three of the original 1898 trees along Sturton Street: each by 5 m in height and 4 m in spread. Why? To address problems detected in a 25-year-old property at 193 Sturton Street – a House in Multiple Occupation (HMO). The papers on the planning portal concerning 22/0271/TTPO are viewed by Friends of St Matthew’s Piece and other Objectors as scanty, flawed and contradictory, building a very weak case for any cutting back any of the trees – never mind all three trees. 

The trees are still at risk. The local community responded magnificently to an appeal from Friends of St Matthew’s Piece to defend them. Within five days, no fewer than 43 local Objections to the planning application were submitted. 28 have been uploaded under the ‘Documents’ tab of the Planning Portal for 22/0271/TTPO; as well as 15 Comments (all objections) under the ‘Public Comments’ tab. The objections are thoughtful, well-informed and effective – worth reading.

If you wish to add your voice to these Public Comments, you can register and submit your views right until the application goes to a meeting of the City Council Planning Committee. 

City Councillor for Petersfield Ward, Richard Robertson, has ‘called in’ the application, which means it can no longer be decided by a Planning Officer but must go before the Planning Committee to be determined. We don’t yet know when this will happen (the next meetings are 14th June and 6th July 2022). 

Arguments against the proposal are varied and wide-ranging. Many wrote in support of the importance, value, diverse environmental roles and beauty of these historic trees. The most powerful perhaps relate to water, as explained in pp 17–19  of the full submission by Friends of St Matthew’s Piece –Objection to 22/0271/TTPO.

The insurance company could spend upwards of £80,000 to underpin 193 Sturton Street, to address the subsidence they have found there since the summer of 2019. The alternative they propose instead is to severely cut back our three protected trees and spend around £8,000 to repair the cracks and redecorate. They argue that the damage to the house is due to the trees taking up too much water, and have tried to prove this by measuring the movement of the house at 8 different points over the course of 1 year, running May-to-May. Here is their graph:

Graph titled:
Precise level monitoring for points 1 to 8 - related to drain

But are our trees the true cause of this subsidence?

The lower curves on the insurance company’s graph, the ones showing the most movement, all echo precisely that seen – on a matching May-to-May horizontal axis – in the annual variation in soil moisture deficit (SMD). This 2nd graph is from the Environment Agency, based on more than 60 years of data. This shows a predictable and well established regional seasonal pattern in soil moisture deficit:

Environment Agency Graph 
East Anglia
Ranking derived from data for the period Jan-1961 to Dec-2017
Horizontal axis: May 2020 to May 2021
Vertical axis: soil moisture deficit (mm)
Source: Environment Agency Monthly Water Situation Report

Parts of 193 Sturton St have therefore been recorded as moving entirely in synchrony with the: 

  • longstanding, 
  • natural, 
  • firmly established, and 
  • widespread 

annual cycle of soil drying under the property. This occurs over the entire East Anglian region – irrespective of any effect of trees on St Matthew’s Piece. It is the view of Friends of St Matthew’s Piece that no evidence is produced in planning application 22/0271/TTPO that crown reduction and spread reduction of our three trees would have any significant or sustained protective impact at 193 Sturton Street – in the inescapable context of this annual hydrogeological cycle. 

Furthermore: many houses are just as close to St Matthew’s Piece trees but it is only this one that has cracks – the problem seems to be with this new house, not with these old trees.


Local residents may also recall the long-running dispute about the trees at Alexandra Gardens Residents set up 24/7 watch over Alexandra Gardens trees in Cambridge to ‘keep chainsaws at bay’ [Mike Scialom – Cambridge Independent – 06 August 2021]


How many more Cambridge trees will face similar threats, when the fundamental problem is unlikely to be the trees themselves but over-abstraction of water associated with over-development and its impact on the local water table?


If you would like to join Friends of St Matthew’s Piece or assist in any of the issues raised in this blogpost, kindly hosted by Mill Road Bridges, please email Friends of St Matthew’s Piece.

Bibimbap House – Planning update

We reported, earlier, on this planning application Planned Replacement for Bibimbap House – How Big?

We can now report that the application has been withdrawn. See the text of the letter (below) from Luke Waddington, Planning Officer, Greater Cambridge Shared Planning.

Existing building with restaurant on ground floor
Proposed building with additional storeys and restaurant on ground-floor and in basement
(Application now withdrawn)

Cambridge City Council
Application for Planning Permission

Why you have received this letter

Reference: 21/01609/FUL

Proposal: Demolition of existing HMO and construction of 7 no. replacement 1 bedroom apartments and 1 no. restaurant

Site address: 60 Mill Road Cambridge CB1 2AS

Further to previous correspondence relating to the above matter, I write to inform you that the applicant has asked for the application to be withdrawn. Accordingly, we have stopped all work on processing the application and no decision will be made. There is no right of appeal against such a decision.

What happens next?

The applicant may choose to re-submit this or an amended application to us at a future date. We will notify you again if such an application is submitted.

Tracking future applications

Through our web site you can save searches on specific criteria such as a property address or mapped area, you can then choose to receive updates by email when new applications are submitted meeting your criteria.

To use this facility you will need to register a user account on the website. Go to https://applications.greatercambridgeplanning.org for more details.

Should you wish to discuss this application please contact me.

Yours sincerely

Luke Waddington, Planning Officer, Greater Cambridge Shared Planning.

Planned Replacement for Bibimbap House – How Big?

Plans have been submitted to the Greater Cambridge Shared Planning service for the complete demolition of the Bibimbap House Korean Restaurant building and the residential accommodation above and behind it. If approved, the existing three-story building would be replaced by a five-storey building, with an additional basement.

Existing building with restaurant on ground floor
Proposed building with additional storeys and restaurant on ground-floor and in basement

What do you think of these proposals? You can check out the full details, and download all of the drawings, here.

Read the comments which other local residents have made about the application, here. You will note that there is a very thorough, detailed objection from the occupant(s) of 21 Mill Street.

If you’d like your views taken into account by the planning committee, log in to the planning portal and submit your own comment here.


This post is open for comments, but please remember that nothing published on our website can be considered by the City Council’s planning committee. You are, however, welcome to use this space to encourage others to submit their own comments on the planning portal.

Victory for Friends of St Matthew’s Piece

Image of planning proposal, with word refused superimposed
Celebratory poster. Email Friends.of.st.matthews.piece@gmail.com to request a copy of the poster to print out.

On Wednesday 24 March 2021, 10.00 am, deep in cyberspace, Super Matt the super squirrel defeated The Thing From Outer Space!

More prosaically Cambridge City Council’s planning committee held a virtual meeting, in which the application to build a block of student flats on St Matthew’s Piece by developers Federated Hermes was considered.

Planning Officers recommended refusal of the application, although there were certain aspects of the local plan and of planning considerations which the development would have satisfied. You can read/download the full officer report (PDF 3.3MB) here (pp187-240).

Of course Super Matt had help from all of the community and Friends of St Matthew’s Piece had massive support for their objection to these plans.

A shoutout to Val Neal who gave a good presentation at the online meeting!

Agnès Aubert, Sleaford Street, on Nextdoor

Would you be able to display Friends of St Matthew’s Piece’s new ‘Refused’ poster in your window?

If yes, please email Email Friends.of.st.matthews.piece@gmail.com to request a copy of the poster to print out. Or just smile and celebrate every time you pass one in the area! Thank you all for your crucial efforts to protect our park.

Of course, any further attempts from these (or any other) developers may emerge. The community would then choose its response.

Everyone’s support and active contributions to preserving, celebrating and protecting St Matthew’s Piece would be very welcome!

Val Neal, North Petersfield, on Nextdoor

As others have posted out, the developers could appeal or submit a modified proposal, so local residents will have to keep being vigilant.

What happens next?

The applicant now has a right of appeal to the Planning Inspectorate against our decision to refuse this application. The appeal must be lodged within 6 months of the date of this decision. In the event of an appeal being lodged, and if you have previously commented, we will notify you and forward any comments you may have made to the Planning Inspectorate.

The applicant also has the right to re-submit an amended scheme which may seek to overcome our reasons for refusal. We will notify you again if such an application is submitted.

Notification from Greater Cambridge Joint Planning to people who commented on the application

However, the redoubtable Roy Stamp strikes a positive note…

In Romsey Terrace, we found that fighting an appeal made residents more determined: the residents won in the end!

Roy Stamp, Romsey, on Nextdoor

It is difficult to second guess what this multi-national investment fund will do next.

It is possible that when they bought the site from Chard Robinson they were told, based on the previous scheme that was consulted on but was never actually submitted, that there was development potential.

At the planning committee their agent Bidwells claimed that pre application advice given by the planners at that time was positive, but this has little status as it is not binding on the Council. It is a very weak argument and I was surprised it was even mentioned.

The main problem, if they appeal, is the fairly new National Planning Policy Framework introduced by the LibDem Tory coalition government in 2012. This planning directive considerably weakened the power of local councils’ decision-making powers and introduced an overarching presumption in favour of development. It also gave more power to planning inspectors to award the applicants appeal costs adainst local councils.

This happened five years ago in Station Road where the City turned down plans for a massive office block. BrookGate won the appeal and the Council was forced to pay them £175,000. The reasons for refusal in this case by Cambridge City Council are, however, very robust and are taken from the approved local plan so we are in a strong position.

If Federated Hermes are realistic they will give up as, given the strength of feeling, the local Councillors will undoubtably put considerable funds into the defence of the Councils position at any appeal hearing.

Local activist and fount of knowledge on planning, Frank Gawthrop, South Petersfield, on Nextdoor

Wildflowers for St Matthew’s Piece

While many of us hit the shops for last-minute lockdown supplies this week, volunteers on St Matthew’s Piece were stocking the larder for insects.

Bees and other pollinating insects are essential to the life cycle of plants. But their numbers are plunging as the amount of open land dwindles and their sources of food disappear.

Volunteers from On the Verge Cambridge and Friends of St Matthew’s Piece came together on a sunny November morning to plant the Piece with hundreds of wildflower bulbs. On the Verge Cambridge works with schools and community groups to plant wildflowers in suitable spots, so insects don’t have to fly long distances in search of food.

Ben Greig and Jo Scrivens from On the Verge Cambridge, with volunteers from Friends of St Matthew’s Piece setting up their banners before planting wildflowers

The group planted anemones, bluebells, winter aconite, wild garlic, crocuses and snakeshead fritillaries, each in a different part of the park. When the flowers bloom, they will provide a rich supply of nectar.

Ben Greig from On the Verge Cambridge, planting wildflowers on ST Matthew’s Piece

St Matthews’ Piece is currently threatened by developers who wish to build a large block of flats on its northern edge.

Artist’s impression of the student flats hovering over the former Howard Mallett Centre like an alien spaceship

“It’s such a beautiful place, with all its stately trees – but developers want to cut some of them down,” said Janet Wright, of Friends of St Matthew’s Piece.

“So many people come here with their children or just to take a walk. From next year on, they’ll be spotting flashes of colour as various flowers start coming up. I just hope they won’t have a block of flats looming over them.”

“Quite a few people walking through the Piece were pleased that we were planting flowers and hoped the planned development wouldn’t be allowed.”


Friends of St Matthew’s Piece can be contacted by email at friends.of.st.matthews.piece@gmail.com or followed and liked (here) on Facebook.


Ben Greig and Jo Scrivens from On the Verge Cambridge

Find out more about On the Verge Cambridge, here, or email Ben Greig, Alice Willitts and Jo Scrivens by email at onthevergecambridge@gmail.com.

Peace campaigner now speaks up for the Piece

She defended her country in the Second World War — now Dorothy Runnicles is defending St Matthew’s Piece. 

By Janet Wright
for Friends of St Matthew’s Piece

Dorothy Runnicles

Developers who want to build a large block of student flats on the edge of this small but well-used Petersfield park slipped a consultation document out in April, while most people were preoccupied with lockdown.

“As a former local resident, now 95, I totally reject the proposed centre,” Dorothy wrote to developers Federated Hermes, along with more than 100 local residents who also sent in their objections. Though confined to her present home in Gloucester by the pandemic, she sent her support to Friends of St Matthew’s Piece.

After her wartime service in the Royal Navy’s Fleet Air Arm, Dorothy became a pacifist, trained as a social worker and is still active in numerous community groups. In recent years she has advised the government, NHS and national charities on issues around inclusion and ageism. Due to represent the navy at the 75th anniversary of VE Day, Dorothy was instead phoned by the Princess Royal when all events were cancelled. 

A founder-member of Petersfield Area Community Trust, she has studied the results of increasing inequality, 20 years after a survey found that 10% of the Petersfield population lived below the poverty line. 

“The statement ‘We’re in it together’ has to be challenged,” Dorothy told Friends of St Matthew’s Piece. “The private business world is achieving what it wants. This area has a long history of continuous development, and of losing community assets.”

Petersfield, though densely populated, has less public open space than any other ward in Cambridge.

Artist’s impression of the student flats hovering over the former Howard Mallett Centre like an alien spaceship

“There are lots of people in Petersfield without gardens, some occupying one room in a house,” says Dorothy. “If people haven’t got gardens and haven’t got much money, they need free access to some open space. That’s being deliberately taken away from Petersfield.”

Click the image to learn about Super Matt’s campaign

The proposed student flats would be built above the former Howard Mallett youth centre – Dorothy notes that rates of youth offending increased after the centre was closed. Developers would also fell at least two of the mighty plane trees that are a feature of St Matthew’s Piece.

“Trees are extremely important,” says Dorothy. All the evidence shows there’s something important about the function of trees. Loss of trees is a health problem. Losing the big trees that are protecting our environment is extremely risky.”


Friends of St Matthew’s Piece can be contacted by email at friends.of.st.matthews.piece@gmail.com or followed and liked (here) on Facebook.


And see the Friends of St Matthew’s Piece campaign video…


Learn more about Dorothy on the National Development Team for Inclusion website, here.

Watch video recordings of Dorothy on Legasee – The Veterans Video Archive, here .