28/02/2017 Look East (West)

Tackling the region's housing crisis ...plans for a new six thousand home

The town with big ambition - Luton bids to be the UKs

And I will be here with a rather changeable local forecast for you.

It could it be one answer to Cambridge's housing shortage,

Plans have been submitted for 6,000 new homes at the Waterbeach Barracks

site, along with four new schools and a museum.

But, as Mousumi Bakshi reports, there are concerns about pressure

Where once there were military drills, soon there will be diggers.

The site, which is owned by the Ministry of Defence,

and vacated by the Army five years ago, is to become

Around ?2 billion is being invested in the area around Waterbeach,

money that provides four schools, a hotel and over 6,000 homes.

This is a huge site, and really the best brownfield site

in England at the moment, a site crying out to be developed,

and we think it is big enough to offer a range of affordable

homes, family homes, and some apartments as well.

We have a fantastic 20 acre lake on site, which is ripe for some sort

Housing is an emotive issue, and it has certainly been

We are just four miles outside of Cambridge,

one of the most notoriously expensive places to

Developers here have pledged to keep house prices affordable,

but can they make similar pledges on the A10?

The developers agree that the road which connects Cambridge to Ely

is already at capacity, but it is up to the county council,

and ultimately the government, to make a decision about

One local councillor who was concerned says newly

devolved powers will make an upgrade of the A10 more likely.

We have just won devolution for Cambridgeshire.

We are getting new powers and funding, and while it won't pay

for the upgrade to the A10, it puts the A10, which is in

the devolution agreement, much higher up the priority list,

and I will be lobbying whoever is the new mayor for the A10.

It is widely accepted more new homes in this part

of the region are needed, but people in Waterbeach

are concerned about the impacts of such a large development.

Hopefully, when they go ahead, they will do the infrastructure,

because if they are going to rely on local surgeries

and stuff like that, it is going to be a nightmare.

They need more shops, they need everything up there,

but I would worry partly about the roads coming

Building work is yet to start but over 200 flats

At the hospital, and some of the income made will be ploughed

back into the Treasury, as the site is owned by the MoD.

Waterbeach is one of several ex-military bases in the region

Our political reporter Tom Barton has been at another,

Most of the 10,000 homes being built here at Northstowe are being built

on former military land, just as is the case in Waterbeach.

But it is not just these two former bases, also in RAF Alconbury,

All of these bases, former military land has been allocated

for housing and as far as the military is concerned,

They have more land than they need, but also they can make money

There is, though, a bigger reason, as far as the government

is concerned, and that is that it provides a way for them

to address the need for more houses to be built.

And the government is taking a particular hands-on approach

Normally, on these sorts of sites, the land is sold to a developer,

who builds houses and sells them to the public.

The problem with that is that military land is not

worth very much money, and houses can sometimes

be built quite slowly, so the government is getting more

involved to make sure that everything happens

as quickly as possible, but also by staying in the process

for longer, it means at the end of the day,

when the land is sold, they get more money for it.

A Northamptonshire Police Officer, accused of raping a teenager

he was sent to help, was today found not guilty.

PC Declan Gabriel was charged with the rape and sexual assault

against the 17-year-old while on duty in 2015.

The jury at Northampton Crown Court failed to reach a verdict

Ambitious plans have been unveiled by Luton council to bid to be

It's a title given out every four years to a UK city or large town

Milton Keynes is bidding to be European Capital of Culture in 2023,

But, as Nicola Haseler reports, organisers of Luton's bid think

This is how the city of Hull welcomed in the New Year,

Now Luton has an ambitious plan to win the same title in 2025.

Luton is steeped in history and culture already.

This is about lifting any barriers there might be,

and putting Luton on the stage, in the same way as

And if you haven't had the chance to go and see Hull,

see what they have done there and see the huge, huge

Rehearsing today for a performance at the reopening

of the Wardown Park Museum in April is the original girls choir

from Luton, who travelled around the world in the 1960s.

What are their memories of the arts in Luton?

There were lots of musical activities in Luton,

and lots of amateur dramatics, as well.

You could go to the George Hotel, dancing, meeting people.

Going into Luton, mostly, it was going to the Wardown Park,

where probably on a Sunday when the Luton band was playing.

The bandstand concerts are from a Luton of yesteryear.

The biggest cultural event today is the carnival, celebrating

If you have walked out of Luton station recently,

you will have been greeted by this new light box installation

by the Turner Prize nominee Mark Titchner, and it seems very

appropriate to Luton's ambitions to become UK cultural city.

But there are questions over whether this bid is worth the money.

People walk along and they are looking on the ground,

they are thinking, how are we going to make

Art is a simple thing, it is an expressive thing.

I think the issue around funding for arts and culture

Arts and culture enriches lives, it creates opportunity,

builds inspiration and ambition, and on the back of that, surely,

you get community cohesion, and harmony and growth.

I think art and culture are the bedrock of growing a really

So could Luton become a future city of culture?

The belief from those who have seen Hull, is that it can.

So how have previous winners benefited from

I asked Mickey Bradley - former member of the band The Undertones -

what being City of Culture in 2013 did for Derry in Northern Ireland.

During the year, during 2013 itself, we had a great time.

I think most people in the city, virtually everyone in the city,

would have gone to at least some event that was there.

We had the the All-Ireland Fleadh, everyone out

We had Radio 1's Big Weekend, and then smaller events.

Visiting exhibitions, concerts, so we all had

Were there any lasting benefits, I am thinking about economic

Council and various elements of the great and good

said this could change, it will attract business,

it will attract jobs and so on, but I think most people in Derry

I did not see it as an opportunity to develop the city's

economy, just thought of it as a reason to celebrate.

Do you think there has been a cultural legacy,

are there more people getting involved in the arts?

And also people who maybe are not involved in the arts,

but they recognise it, they were exposed to more.

What advice would you give to the people behind

See if you can make as many events as possible free,

because if people aren't sure about something that is coming,

they are not necessarily willing to put their hands in the pockets

Don't aim low, aim high, because people really want to see

Football - and several of our teams have been in action tonight.

In the Sky Bet League One, MK Dons drew 2-2 at Bradford.

And Northampton Town lost 2-1 at home with Oldham.

In League Two, Cambridge lost 3-2 to Doncaster, and Stevenage

That's all from the team here in Cambridge tonight,

we'll leave you now with Julie and the forecast.

Hello there. Once the last of any showers Anne Main has cleared it

will become largely dry with very little cloud. Underneath his clear

skies we could see temperatures lower than these values, down to

around freezing, so out of the wind and sheltered spots we could get a

frost. Then tomorrow this were the front pushing in from the

south-west. Even at the state we are not quite sure how quickly it will

move Insua does look like a cold, bright start with a good deal of

sunshine, and then eventually we expect this thick cloud and the rain

to start moving erratically in from the south. Temperatures tomorrow

around nine Celsius, at best. Through the afternoon it could be

the extreme north stays largely dry during daylight hours. In a moment,

the National forecast but I will leave you with the outlook. On

Thursday, some showers around they should clear. We are expecting some

quite windy conditions on Thursday with perhaps reaching strong to near

gale force at times, some rain to Good evening. We are about to head

into March, the days are getting longer, but are they getting any

warmer? Not really. We will get there in the end, but we will have

to be patient, not very springlike at the moment. Some showers

scattered around across England and Wales will tend to diminish in

number, a few left behind, wintry showers across the north of

Scotland, snow at low-level is, ice as well as temperatures fall close

to freezing. A cold night with a touch of frost in a number of

places. Plenty of sunshine across southern areas first of all, but it

will not last, rain spilling from the south, the best brightness and

eventually further