Cambridge planners have unanimously rejected an office scheme that had been pitched as among the city’s most sustainable.
Pace Investment’s plans for 104-112 Hills Road include demolishing several buildings on the 2.6-acre site and constructing two new buildings of five and seven storeys, with 287,000 sq ft of offices as well as food and beverage space.
Over a five-hour debate, the scheme was criticised on various grounds, including its design and scale; the plans for a 200-space car park, which some committee members said seemed at odds with its sustainability focus; the damage done to the Flying Pig pub on the site; and the lack of any housing provision in the scheme.
All seven committee members went against planning officers’ recommendation to approve the plans, with the official reasons given as a failure to provide an appropriate mix of uses; inappropriate design and scale; and a lack of clarity over support for the future of the Flying Pig.
Councillor Richard Robertson – not a member of the planning committee – spoke in objection of the scheme, describing it as a “thoroughly unpleasant and ill-thought-through proposal”.
“The design does not meet expectations for buildings on such a prominent site,” he added. “It would result in an excessively large set of office blocks out of keeping with its setting and risking the quality of the conservation area and the [nearby] listed Botanic Garden.”
Jonathan Bainbridge, a partner in the planning team at Bidwells, which advised Pace Investments on the proposals, said during the planning meeting that the aim of the development had been to work up “a scheme that places sustainability and wellbeing at its heart”.
Bainbridge added that the planning officers’ report on the plans presented it as “economically, environmentally and socially sustainable”. “It really isn’t just rhetoric when we say that this development will be one of the most sustainable new-build office schemes in Cambridge,” he said.
The buildings were planned as the first new-build offices in Cambridge to meet BREEAM Outstanding accreditation, Pace said, putting them in the top 1% of all buildings in the country for sustainability. The developer also targeted WELL Platinum and WiredScore Platinum accreditation.
The all-electric buildings were pitched as zero carbon in operation, with water consumption 55% lower than a typical office building and 40% less energy than a typical workplace and, when accounting for embodied carbon, would result in 75% less carbon over a 30-year lifecycle.
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