Two electric bikes have been located on the ‘Skate Park’ close to the Sports and Social Club for use by Hardwick residents. To use you will need to download the ‘bizbike’ app and follow the instructions. Alternatively you can follow this link: https://cambridgeelectrictransport.co.uk/electric-bike/
Hopefully, if successful more could follow.
Quote: The Combined Authority has approved new contracts for 17 out of 18 bus services cut by Stagecoach.
Approval has been given for new contracts for bus operators to run services on 17 out of 18 routes which Stagecoach East announced would be withdrawn from October 30.
The decision was made by the Combined Authority Board yesterday (October 19).
On September 20, Stagecoach East announced they were pulling out of 18 services completely and reducing five significantly.
The Combined Authority went to urgent tender with potential operators the following day with the aim of continuing as many of those services as possible.
The current position is that 17 of the 18 services cut by Stagecoach, along with all of the five reduced services, have all received quotes from new operators.
The remaining route, service 39, has been covered apart from the section between Chatteris and March.
The Combined Authority is continuing to have discussions with operators about covering this service.
Mayor Dr Nik Johnson said: “This whole situation has been very worrying for communities and the Combined Authority has, rightly, worked with urgency on this tendering process to get buses running on those former Stagecoach routes after October 30.
“What is positive is that we have received tenders for all but part of one of those routes and the Combined Authority’s work is ongoing in trying to find an operator in this case.”
The approved routes will require some of the £1.7m set aside by the Combined Authority for subsidies to operators to keep them running.
The current position is that the total cost is expected to be about £1.25m and the tender process has shown that the money made available by the Combined Authority is very likely to be enough to cover all the routes where there are operators with the capacity to run them.
For legal reasons around the tendering process, the Combined Authority is not yet able to confirm which bus operators are the preferred bidder for each route and not is it able to confirm the route timetables.
Operators and new timetables will be confirmed at the end of what is called a standstill period lasting 10 days.
This is a legal requirement attached to this tendering process which allows suppliers an opportunity to challenge any decision.
New contracts with bus operators will run until the end of March 2023.
Mayor Johnson added: “Looking beyond these immediate challenges, the whole bus system in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough needs bold change because it clearly isn’t working.
“There are many challenges ahead, but work on a better future is being done by the Combined Authority.”
This is being sent in reponse to the letter posted by Dr Johnson in regard to the upcoming bus changes affecting Hardwick.
Dear Nik,
We are writing to express our deep concerns about the bus service between Hardwick and
Cambridge City and to urge you to reinstate this service after the October 30th cuts.
The loss of this is indispensable route has already had a disastrous impact in the village. People are
struggling to understand the full impact of the cut, which severs their link with key larger settlements
and the opportunity that affords.
These are not unused or unwanted services – stops along St Neots Road are used regularly at all
times of day. These include children going to secondary school, commuters who have heeded the call
to use public transport, jobseekers and those most vulnerable looking to access services in
Cambridge. Some of the sites they use every day have even been upgraded with new shelters or
cycle storage at taxpayers’ expense, money seemingly wasted. Despite this, the service remains the
only route you have offered little to no clarity on continuing and has no promise of funding beyond
the cut off date at the end of the month. The situation is clearly untenable and needs to be
addressed by the Combined Authority as a matter of urgency.
Sadly, the problems will not end with a mere reinstatement of the service. Even while the service is
running, buses are regularly cancelled without warning or sit idly in Drummer Street, the driver in
place but no access allowed. Constituents are often left waiting for almost an hour, at which point a
bus may or may not appear, and if it does not at the time specified by Stagecoach. If you are to take
charge of this service or find a replacement, we would appreciate a guarantee that the service will be
run to the highest possible standard.
All of this comes at a time of great uncertainty for our community. Hardwick is already isolated, and
it takes time for news to filter through our community. Many of those most affected by these
changes do not benefit from online updates and require a thorough process of engagement to be
heard. So far, your responses have largely been targeted at the media, with little information offered
to residents directly or their councillors at all levels. As local representatives, we would appreciate
more transparency and stand ready to assist in disseminating key information to our constituents.
In light of the concerns above, we would appreciate a full and open response to the following
questions:
1. What reassurance can you offer that services between Hardwick to Cambridge will be reinstated?
2. What is your strategy to offer a more reliable service for the same area?
3. Will you undertake a full engagement process with residents to ensure they are informed and
understand what the future options are for transport in the area.
We would be grateful for reassurance that steps are being taken to ensure that Hardwick and
Caldecote to have a functioning, regular bus service after 30th October.
Anthony Browne MP
Cllr Lina Nieto, Hardwick and Toft
“The Transport Strategy team at Cambridgeshire County Council has developed three draft transport
strategies that will set the County Council’s transport policy approach for the districts of Fenland and
Huntingdonshire, and for active travel across the whole county. We are now consulting with all
stakeholders and the public on the draft strategies to give you the opportunity to input into them
before they are finalised and recommended for adoption in Spring 2023. We would welcome your
comments on the following strategies, and also ask for your help in spreading the word.
– Draft Fenland Transport Strategy
– Draft Huntingdonshire Transport Strategy
– Draft Cambridgeshire’s Active Travel Strategy
The public consultation survey is now live and can be accessed on our consultation website here
https://consultcambs.uk.engagementhq.com/. Please select which strategy you would like to find out
more, read the draft strategy and provide your views by completing the online survey. The survey will
close on Monday 7th November 2022. We welcome your response for any combination of the three
strategies dependent on your interest.
We want to ensure we reach as much of the general public as possible so we also ask that you
display/share the promotional materials attached, or the link to the survey to your contacts, or add the
information to any newsletters/social media pages you produce. If you would like printed copies to be
sent, please get in touch. Alternatively, watch out for the County Council’s social media posts and
share as appropriate.
We will be holding a number of events, and paper copies of the strategies are available at selected
libraries, all listed in the leaflet attached.
If you have any questions please do get in touch. We thank you in advance of your support in
spreading the word, and hope you will take time to respond to the surveys.”
Kind regards,
Transport Strategy Team
Transport Strategy & Funding
Cambridgeshire County Council
Email: transport.plan@cambridgeshire.gov.uk
Mayor of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Dr Nik Johnson has made the following statement after Stagecoach announced the cancellation of a range of bus routes in the region:
Last night, I instructed Combined Authority officers to start an urgent process with bus operators with the aim of continuing as many of the bus routes as possible that are set to be cut by Stagecoach from October 30.
The process will take about three weeks to finish and the aim is to keep as many of these services running as possible through to March 2023.
Any decision to keep bus routes going will be put to the Combined Authority Board for approval when it meets on October 19, and after the three-week process has worked out all the options.
It does therefore unfortunately mean a short wait while the Combined Authority looks for bus operators for the routes, but we will be keeping the public updated as soon as we have information to share.
For this process, the Stagecoach services we are looking at are those announced as being withdrawn from October 30, namely the 11/X11, 12, 18, 25, 39, 915, V1, V2, V3, V4, V5, 22, 30, 35, 66; and in Peterborough, the 23, 24 and 29. In addition we are looking at sections of route withdrawn on Citi5 beyond Northstowe, Citi8 beyond Cottenham and Citi4 along St Neots Road, as well as a service for March town.
The £1.7m funding for this process has come from two sources. The majority is from savings arising due to reduced amount of Combined Authority payments to bus operators caused by Covid-19. A smaller amount is from the Bus Recovery Grant offered by Government to help keep some services going.
In my time so far as Mayor, no issue has evoked as strong a response as this announcement by Stagecoach. My mailbox is full of emails from residents concerned about the loss of their service, from teachers who won’t be able to get to school to teach and students who won’t be able to get to college, to older members of our society who will lose their only means of transportation out of their village to get to the shops or attend essential hospital appointments. It will also lead to more cars on our already overburdened roads, which goes against our need to cut carbon emissions across our districts. I maintain that this decision by Stagecoach, whilst they continue to receive government funding, is absolutely unacceptable, and the timing during a cost-of-living crisis could not be worse.
We will continue to update the public on developments at every step of the way.
In the meantime I will be writing to Government to reiterate the major challenges facing our bus network and the need for more funding to keep services going.
While stepping in to support bus services is necessary in the short term, it is clearly not sustainable in the long term. There has already been a severe lack of national investment and vision for buses going back decades. Covid-19 has brought many of the issues around passenger numbers, especially in rural areas and in our market towns, to a head.
Change and a new future for our whole bus system is needed. The Combined Authority has been working on that new future through a dedicated Bus Strategy with the aim of providing high quality services for passengers, wherever they live and whatever their income.
There are options for how we make the change needed, but it must involve partnership working across the region, including with councils and with Government.
Dear resident,
We have some interesting news regarding street names of Capstone Fields – which is the new development of 155 dwellings happening on St Neot’s Road.Hardwick Parish Council has asked the developers to name the streets in the development in memory of deceased former residents of the village.The Parish Council has considered residents who have now sadly passed away but who it believes made a significant and special contribution to the village during their lifetime.This Parish Council proposal has been agreed by the developers and by South Cambridgeshire District Council and the street names will be:
| Street name | In memory of |
|---|---|
| Howells Way | Lynne Howells |
| Lofty Close | Ann Lofty |
| Turner Close | Ken Turner |
| Bhachu Drive | Jagmohan Bhachu and Tejinder Bhachu |
| Barker Way | Ray Barker |
Any queries about the above, please contact the clerk