Oxford-Milton Keynes-Cambridge Corridor
Client
National Infrastructure Commission
Collaborators
SQW
5th Studio were appointed by the National Infrastructure Commission to make recommendations on the Built Environment of the Oxford-Milton Keynes-Cambridge Corridor. Our involvement with the NIC, Department for Transport & Treasury has been highly regarded and promises to be influential in shaping future policy.
The Oxford-Milton Keynes-Cambridge corridor encompasses a line of towns and cities some 50 miles out from London, each with an unusually productive economy. Competing on a global stage, the knowledge-driven economy of this collection of cities is impressive, but its future economic health is threatened by a lack of suitable housing and the appropriate connective infrastructure to support ‘good growth’.
Our final report produced to inform the work of the National Infrastructure Comissions is available to download here.
The project includes mapping historic growth and urbanisation across the area
The congestion caused by inward commuting threatens the environment and productivity of Oxford and Cambridge in particular. The question of housing has been delegated to the market, which left to its own devices is failing to deliver adequate numbers and is also making poor use of finite resources. 5th Studio’s study implicitly explores the potential that could emerge from making the corridor more functional, linking existing economic clusters in a way that creates more than the sum of its parts, while accommodating anticipated growth for the next 30 years.
The study has involved mapping and developing a thorough understanding of the wider regional context, and a review of best-practice examples of innovation districts around the world, and how they are changing. The report makes recommendations for a spatial framework, safeguarding and reinforcing the vitality of this arc of high productivity locations.
The Cambridge-Milton Keynes-Oxford corridor in the context of a range of other established growth corridors
...their creative analysis of space, and understanding of place, has exceeded expectations... Their outputs are proven to be both visually appealing, and capable of bringing abstract spatial concepts and relationships ‘to life’ for analysts and decision-makers. 5th Studio’s work has been vital in securing the confidence of senior stakeholders and in communicating analyses and conclusions to a generalist audience.
The National Infrastructure Commission describing our work
The potential future rail network on completion of East West Rail and HS2, with the core study area highlighted
On completion of the typologies a hypothetical scenario that deployed the various development types across the region was developed, with the target of accommodating an additional 1.9 million people by 2050
Diagram expressing contrasting approaches to the deployment of infrastructure and settlement (the area of black is the same in both diagrams)
Nine different settlement typologies are explored in the study, through nine real-world case study locations
Case study exploring the ‘Strong Edge and Satellite’ typology through the development of a spatial framework for growth to the north of Oxford
Aerial overview of the case study location to the north of Oxford
The flooded former brick pits at Calvert
Plan of the case study proposal for a new city, located at Calvert
The central square of the 'New City' case study at Calvert
The listed structures at the former brickworks at Stewartby
Case study proposal for a new ‘small settlement’ at Stewartby, structured around a high frequency transit line, and the creative re-appropriation of the post-industrial structures and landscapes that characterise Marston Vale
Diagram of a co-ordinated plan, incorporating three of the case study locations, and integrating transport, land- and water-scape, and urban development, for the zone between Milton Keynes and Bedford
Case study proposals for intensification in and around Bedford town centre, as a key location within a comprehensive and legible public transport network across the corridor
The River Ouse at Bedford