Councillor Brent Fielder Chairman Wilden Parish Council South Brook House East End Lane Wilden Beds MK44 2QN

E-mail: [email protected] Tel: 07754 146605 Dear East-West Rail Consultation Team,

Re: EMAIL/LETTER SENT BY PARISH COUNCIL IN APRIL 2020 REGARDING TO CAMBRIDGE ROUTE CONSULTATION – A REPLY FROM WILDEN PARISH COUNCIL

Wilden Parish Council (WPC) have recently become aware of the above email, sent to you by Renhold Parish Council (RPC). It should be pointed out that RPC did not consult with us before sending their response and did not make us aware that they had sent it. WPC wish to point out the many gross inaccuracies and flaws within it.

RPC were responding to the choice of Route E as the Preferred Option (PO) for the new Oxford to Cambridge line. This route was chosen from the five routes that were considered. WPC would have preferred either routes A, B or C as would most Parish Councils along the PO, including RPC, however Option E was chosen as the route corridor for the new railway line.

RPC are almost entirely outside of the chosen route corridor, being a considerable distance to the South of it, and their residents would scarcely be affected wherever the line was sited within the corridor. Indeed, an examination of the map shows that only one single dwelling, on the very Northern tip of the otherwise uninhabited area of their Parish could even be potentially affected from the corridor. However, despite this escape for Renhold, RPC have chosen to use extreme nimbyism in an attempt to change the likely potential route after learning of early survey sites, trying to drastically change the route so that any very, very slight effect on Renhold would be changed to a completely devastating one for the surrounding Parishes of Wilden, , and . They feel that a line running through the middle of these four villages would be preferable to Renhold being very mildly inconvenienced.

WPC’s comments on this wholly inaccurate and misleading missive from RPC are marked in red underlined italics on the attached letter below.

Kind Regards,

Councillor Brent Fielder Chairman, Wilden Parish Council

RENHOLD PARISH COUNCIL

Lizzie Barnicoat Clerk to the Council PO Box 1548 Bedford, MK44 5AX Tel: 01234 771702

April 2020 by e-mail to East West Rail ([email protected])

Dear East West Rail Consultation Team

RE: BEDFORD TO CAMBRIDGE ROUTE CONSULTATION

Following the recent consultation meetings held at and , which many of our Parish Councillors and residents attended, Renhold Parish Council hereby submits its observations and initial comments on the proposals regarding the East West Rail link.

The Parish Council understands that there is a need for a railway line from Bedford to Cambridge as part of the East West Rail route project. However, it cannot support any proposal which will reduce the quality of life of the residents in the parish of Renhold. The inference being that the quality of life of Renhold residents is considered much more important than those of surrounding residents.

Renhold is a small, rural parish, with very few local amenities or facilities. As is Wilden and the vast majority of villages within the preferred route corridor. The Parish Council is very concerned that the proposals will have a fundamental and lifechanging impact on the residents of our village, given its proximity to the proposed route in and around the ancient villages of Ravensden, Renhold and Great Barford. At the risk of pointing out the obvious, Wilden is also a very ancient village, for example its church was built in the 14th Century.

There is some uncertainly as to whether this new link will be a dual track for both electric and diesel trains, or solely electric. Also, it is unknown whether it will serve only passenger trains or will include freight journeys and therefore the frequency of train movements. The route and usage is pure conjecture at this stage, which makes it difficult to give meaningful, constructive feedback comments at this time.

The information gathered from the public exhibitions, viewed together with a helping of common sense, suggests that one possible route would significantly impact on the parish of Renhold with a section whereby the line would drop down from Cleat Hill, run uphill south of Ravensden Church/Horse & Jockey pub and then between Locke’s Farm and Pell’s Farm Shop. Assuming that a bridge would be too expensive, it seems more likely to be a cutting, although again it is challenging to comment on the unknown, given that the exact final route will be determined by the positions of the /Clapham and the Black Cat/ stations. The route RPC refers is self- evidently the one that will cause the least disruption to existing communities as it would only potentially affect one isolated house in the entire Parish of Renhold.

The Parish Council understands that East-West rail follows significantly different planning rules from that of HS2. Attendees were led to believe, during the consultation events, that the route will avoid ancient woodland and monuments/historic sites at all costs, given that such sites would involve archaeology and associated high costs for such investigative works. The Parish Council would therefore at this early stage like to highlight that Renhold has two ancient woodlands (Great Early Grove and Little Early Grove) Neither of these are even within the route corridor or close to the alignment of the potential line that Renhold PC are talking about. which form a County wildlife site that must be preserved. They would not be affected. If the assurances given to many people at the consultations are true and real, then Renhold Parish Council will look to East West Rail to take the necessary steps to protect this important conservation area. They are not within the route corridor and so would not be affected at all.

The proposed route also must avoid It clearly does as all of these are outside the route corridor the many protected historical landscapes in the village. These are: Woodfield (17th century Grade 2 listed), Creakers (site of 13th century Crevequer/Crewker moated manor/castle and earthworks/moat/trout lakes) and Birchfield Farm (site of another 12th century moated manor, Brytvilles). Any potential line would pass to the North of Woodfield/Creakers and South of Birchfield Farm: they would not be affected in any way.To assist in the identification of these important features, we have attached a markedup map of the area. As above, none of these “important features” would be on the likely route as its alignment would avoid all of them.

The Parish Council also feels that as Renhold is a small rural parish, the local arable land must be protected for food production. This is particularly important point as the government has recently announced that they want 20% of all arable land to be forest/ woodland to achieve carbon neutral status by 2050. True but that’s also true of every surrounding village/parish. Renhold is no different in these respects from Wilden, Wyboston, Chawston etc. In fact the longer length of rail route proposed by RPC would push directly through a much higher acreage of high quality arable land, thus negatively impacting on carbon neutral attempts.

In addition, the Parish Council would be strongly opposed to any footpath closures within the parish or near to the proposed route and feels that in the considerations by East West Rail, attention must be paid to ensure that all local residents retain these important rural paths so that access to the countryside is maintained. Only two minor footpaths would be affected in Renhold Parish, however the alternative route proposed by RPC has scant regard for footpaths in other parishes and would cut through many dozens of paths in neighbouring parishes.

The Parish Council believes that by working with neighbouring parishes the most suitable line for the route, in light of the concerns raised above, would be for the line to run south of Ravensden crossroads (Kimbolton Road/Oldways Road junction), then go north of Ravensden Church, proceeding between Sevick End and Wilden Village, south of East End, south of Colesden and across to the A1 just north of the junction with the A421. This is also illustrated on the attached map. RPC’s response is the exact opposite of “…working with neighbouring parishes”. It is in effect saying that rather than have a line coming anywhere near their Parish, irregardless of the fact that it perhaps may affect one house (at worst), RPC would rather it go right through the centre of neighbouring parishes thereby devastatingly affecting whole villages.

This route would affect fewer people, meet fewer heritage problems This is again completely wrong. A line going North of Great Early Grove would result in the woods screening the vast majority of Renhold from the line and would affect no-one in the village. Renhold PCs proposed alternative route would adversely affect vastly many, many more people. It would affect absolutely everyone in Wilden as it would be extremely close to the village and would be in an elevated position above Wilden. It would also ruin the villages of Wyboston, Colesden and Chawston. The truth is that there are no heritage issues for Renhold, the route corridor and therefore any line, would clearly avoid every single site named by RPC. and would also, as a bonus, give a more gentle curve to the track as it comes around Clapham Park. Furthermore, if a concerted effort were to be made with Great Barford landowners, with the prevailing wind mainly from the south in this area, trees could be planted to screen the line from the nearby villages, which would provide mitigation and so lessen the level of impact. So, to sum up, Renhold are determined that the extremely slight potential inconvenience of the rail line to them be shifted so that it instead totally devastates surrounding communities. It is nimbyism in its purest form: there is not a shred of evidence to back up the completely spurious statements contained within this document.

The Parish Council sincerely hopes that East West Rail Consultation Team will listen carefully to these constructive comments, and to those of individual villagers, and will amend and improve its proposals accordingly as the project progresses. Wilden Parish Council sincerely hope that East West Rail will recognise that these ‘constructive comments’ from RPC are in fact totally wild inaccuracies and have been concocted in a desperate attempt to throw the many neighbouring villages including Wilden, Wyboston, Colesden and Chawston ‘under the bus’, or should that be train, in order that Renhold should suffer no mild indirect or slight consequences of the new line.

Yours sincerely,

E. Barnicoat

Lizzie Barnicoat

Renhold Parish Clerk