Alarm at plan to narrow busy Christ’s Lane in Cambridge for two years to build Christ’s College library

Plans to demolish and rebuild a university college library have been presented to councillors amid concerns over the impact on an “enormously popular route” in Cambridge.

Christ’s College set out proposals to demolish and rebuild its undergraduate library to provide more study space and make it more accessible.

Under those plans, Christ’s Lane would be “narrowed” during the construction works, which could take two years.

College representatives and the development team updated councillors on the project plans at a briefing on Monday (19 May). In addition, more than 50 members of the public joined to hear about the proposals.

Cllr Tim Bick (Lib Dem, Market) told the meeting: “I want to really reflect on the concerns that exist amongst many people hearing of this development.

“One is about the access and the environment on Christ’s Lane, it’s an enormously popular route into the city or the two parts of the city centre, and anything which impedes that is going to be a negative.”

He continued: “I may be talking about the construction phase here, but I think that will need to be a lot of scrutiny about the level of intrusion onto onto the lane, which obviously matters to the public widely who use it, but also the businesses that are at ground level on the other side of the lane.”

Cllr Bick raised concerns from residents living opposite the site about the impact on them.

“The proof is going to be on our ability to scrutinise that and see actual drawings and cross sections,” he said.

The library was built in the 1970s and backs onto Christ’s Lane and there had been fears that the walkway would be closed if the plans go ahead.

Michael Parsons, bursar at Christ’s College, said improving the study facilities for students is a “top priority” for the college.

He said the existing undergraduate library is “inadequate” and said students have been giving “consistent feedback over many years” about the lack of study space.

“The project is absolutely vital for college in three ways,” he said. “It provides additional and varied study spaces in the new library and better utilisation of the historic Bodley library and archive spaces.

“It improves accessibility, not just to the new library, but to the old combination room, the parlour, the Bodley library and the archives. And it reduces carbon through replacing gas boilers in the current library with air source heat pumps and through the electrification of the kitchens.”

Cllr Katie Thornburrow (Lab, Petersfield) asked whether the college would keep Christ’s Lane open to the public during the construction of the proposed new library.

Jon Burgess, director of planning and heritage at Turley, which is helping work on the project, said: “We have talked to the county council as highways authority about how we’re going to deal with the construction access, because obviously, it’s quite a tight site, and it’s quite difficult as well, because we know how busy the area is.

“We have got a scheme which we think works quite well, and it involves a combination of having some storage and loading on Christ’s Lane itself, but some of it then being delivered in from via Drummer Street at the top, which is acceptable to the county council and the people who run the bus station. So we won’t be blocking it.

“It will be narrowed for a period of time.”

Mr Burgess said detailed plans on how the construction is proposed to be handled will be submitted as part of the formal planning application.

Representatives from Grafton Architects, which is working on the designs of the proposed new library, said they hope the proposed new library wall facing onto Christ’s Lane will be an improvement.

They said the current brick wall is “not a thing of beauty” and that they want to “give something back to the city”.

“The brick wall that exists, we’ve kept the line of the brick wall, but we’ve given it back its dignity, because at the moment, it’s not a thing of beauty, and we wanted to give something back to the city in terms of the language of the scene,” said Shelley McNamara of Grafton Architects.

They highlighted plans to have new windows into the library, which they said in the evening would also help provide more lighting on Christ’s Lane.

In 2011 and latterly in 2016, planning and listed building consent was given for a new library, enclosure of the library court and provision of a bridge access between the first floor of the library and South Range and Bodley library with internal and external alterations.

The proposal now seeks demolition of the existing library and the replacement with a new library and enhancements of the adjacent kitchen and upper hall areas.