Residents at UK's biggest new 'ghost town' fume as it still has no shops or GP

17 July 2023 , 12:04

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There's nowhere in town for Dan to buy a pint of milk or stop for a coffee (Image: SWNS)

Residents in England's biggest new town have been left furious after developers failed to live up to their promises - forcing them to live without necessities six years on.

Northstowe, located 10 miles from Cambridge, has been left like a 'ghost town' with rows upon rows of newly-built houses, but not a single shop, café, pub or even a GP practice.

Around 10,000 homes are planned with a total population of 26,000, making it the largest new town in Britain since Milton Keynes was built in Buckinghamshire in 1967.

The construction started in 2017 and around 1,200 properties have been built, but families still don't have any basic facilities and have to drive to buy a pint of milk or coffee.

Northstowe is still without any shops, pubs or other amenities after six years of construction (SWNS)

Dan Greef, 42, moved to Northstowe last August with his wife and two young children - aged seven and four - and has been disappointed by the lack of necessities. He said: "A friend gave me a tour of the area in 2017, and back then the site only had a handful of houses. We're now past a thousand homes, and all we've got is a post box."

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Northstowe was supposed to be an eco-community, built to help ease the housing crisis in one of the least affordable parts of the country. On the outskirts of the town, a broken billboard looms into view, promising 'New Homes, New Community'. But residents say developers, L&Q Estates, have drastically failed to deliver on the latter, leaving them concerned and fed-up.

Dan, who owns Deliciously Guilt Free baking company, has been renting a three-bedroom house for almost a year. He moved in when plans to build a community centre were firmly in place, and he believed strong public transport links to Cambridge would suffice while infrastructure development went ahead.

Dan lives in a three-bed house with his family and said there are not enough schools (SWNS)

But shortly after arriving, those plans were delayed, and the guided bus route always proves too busy to use when it passes through his stop. Frustrated by empty promises, Dan said there is still nothing to show for the last six years, apart from more and more houses, which are being built every day.

"If you want to shop you have to drive into Tesco in the next town or into Cambridge," he said. "There is currently one preschool open, but it's at full capacity, and in September it's actually getting smaller.

"This year I've had nowhere for my youngest to go. There are a few schools, but families with younger kids, like myself, are suffering the most."

The locals have "made their own fun" and organised street parties for Christmas and Halloween, but without a community hall, there is nowhere to socialise after dark. "The developers haven't delivered what they should have done by now, but the council don't seem to have been able to enforce what was in the contracts when they were signed," Dan said.

Paperwork lodged by the developer with South Cambridgeshire District Council said a "community centre building will be provided" before the 900th home was occupied. A sports pavilion, it added, "will be completed" before someone moved into the 500th home. But more than 1,200 homes are now occupied, with no shops or community facilities, beyond three schools.

It's been described as a 'ghost town' after L&Q Estates failed to deliver their promises (SWNS)

Dan added: "There are currently portacabins which are being made into a makeshift community centre which is fantastic. But we've been told the real building work won't be completed for three years now. It's very disappointing. At night, it's like a ghost town as there's no nightlife, pubs or restaurants to eat at. It's very quiet.

"Food trucks come through town a few times a week, but you're not going to hang out and sit and eat on the side of the road. Everyone here is desperate to get things in place - and I'm aware that living here is an investment for the future." Dan is positive that Northstowe will be an "amazing place to live" once they have places to meet and socialise, but nobody knows when that will be.

Adrian Clark, L&Q Estates' managing director, said the company understood "residents' concerns and frustrations regarding delivery" but that Northstowe "has all the necessary ingredients to become a successful community". He added: "We have been working hard to meet residents' expectations and deliver on our commitment to the community.

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"While we recognise that there have been delays to our original timescales, work on this development has unfortunately coincided with the outbreak of the pandemic, followed by unprecedented economic and political challenges worldwide, which have inevitably impacted our work."

Harrison Moore