Jas Bhalla Works was appointed alongside a multi-disciplinary team led by Arup to develop a new spatial framework for the future expansion of Cambourne, South Cambridgeshire. Our input has guided the Greater Cambridge Shared Planning Service in their preparation of the Draft Local Plan, which will set out a Development Strategy for new homes, workplaces, community facilities and public services over the next 20 years.

The original masterplan for Cambourne was drawn up by Terry Farrell in the 1990s, conceived as three villages interconnected by open green space and a thriving local centre. Some four decades after its initial conception, the realised development of Cambourne demonstrates a mixed level of success. New homes benefit from immediate and abundant access to nature, and many residential streets are well landscaped. There have simultaneously been significant challenges in delivering a thriving local centre, as plans for a thriving high street were never fully realised.

The planned arrival of East West Rail (EWR), delivery of the Oxford-Cambridge Arc and a new Government-led focus on the development of new settlements in the region will unlock land to the north of Cambourne; a major opportunity to develop a growth strategy that will simultaneously provide much needed new homes and infrastructure in the region, whilst repairing some of the shortcomings with the original masterplan.

We combined our expertise in strategic thinking with our detailed understanding of the delivery of housing and mixed-use facilities to explore how the new EWR station should interface with a thriving local centre. We set out how the delivery of new commercial and civic facilities should complement and bolster Cambourne’s existing provision, establishing the appropriate size of centre that could be supported by this scale of development. Alongside our work on the local centre, we established a range of residential densities to be deployed across the masterplan that underpinned a robust phasing strategy and viability assessment.

Our outputs leverage extensive experience developing large-scale suburban masterplans, as well as our research and work on urban strategies for new town centres and existing high streets.

The draft Greater Cambridge Local Plan was published for consultation in December 2025.