The formation of South Newnham Neighbourhood Forum was initiated by a group of local residents who attended the Prince’s Foundation briefing on BIMBY “Beauty in my back yard” in 2016 and were encouraged to form an organisation ‘designated’ by the Local Authority to develop a Neighbourhood Plan (NP).

Residents were concerned about the threats posed by global environmental trends and extensive development schemes, as well as the number of individual demolitions/rebuilds and significant house extensions within our neighbourhood and took this opportunity to develop a NP.   Its objective was to protect and enhance the South Newnham neighbourhood with its valued street scenes, and the local environment of the Cam River corridor and green spaces with their trees, fields, hedgerows, wildflowers, and diverse wildlife habitats, and thereby also help to secure a vibrant biodiversity for future generations of Cambridge residents and visitors.

Meetings were held with Cambridge City Planning Department and the Forum was formally ‘designated’ in March 2017 under the provisions of the Localism Act 2011, and of the Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012, as the “South Newnham Neighbourhood”. The designation was to last five years. At the same time, the Forum became Statutory Consultees, allowing it to comment on Cambridge City Council Planning Applications but held no statutory powers.  All responses made by the Forum to Planning Applications have been based on the policies of the Cambridge City Council Local Plan 2018 and the National Planning Framework Guidelines.   

The First AGM was held on 22nd May 2017 with the adoption of the Constitution.

At the end of its five-year designation, the Forum applied to Cambridge City Council in March 2022 for re-designation.  As part of a six-week consultation for the re-designation of the Forum, two drop-in events were held on 28th May and 11th June 2022 at Newnham Croft Sports and Social Club and attended by members of the public.  Sections of the Neighbourhood Plan, including the proposed Policies, Maps and extracts from the Evidence Base were displayed and members were on hand to answer questions. 

Following the six-week consultation process, the Forum was formally re-designated on 21st July 2022, by the Executive Councillor for Planning and Infrastructure for Cambridge City Council. See link for the public record of the re-designation: https://www.cambridge.gov.uk/neighbourhood-area-designations

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