Current Cambridge City Council proposals will mean the death of our traditional market, on which locals rely. These proposals are already driving away local traders; those who serve us. People living and working in and around Cambridge.

Local people rely on Cambridge’s 7-day-a-week traditional market.  Our market traders offer us fresh local and exotic fruit and veg, fish, cheese, bread, specialist health foods, teas and coffees, flowers, books, deli goods, quality olive oils, clothes, hats, cycle sales and repairs, beautiful crafts and exotic stones, and so much more.  The Sunday market brings local organic veg and fruit, and even more local meat from cattle grazed on Cambridge’s commons.  Our many visitors are further served by the wide range of hot food stalls.  

City Council proposals for the market have been brewing for the past 7 years.  And over this time traders have been living with constant uncertainty about their future.  But when Covid struck, our essential traders were amazing.  They went many ‘extra miles’ for us. Long queues snaked the market when supermarket shelves were empty. Alongside their normal long days, traders made up orders, and ‘after hours’ they delivered to those who could not get into the market.  

The Council now plans to replace all of our market’s existing stalls. There will be a small number of ‘new’ permanent stalls; the rest will be demountable stalls.  The new permanent stalls cluster around seating – everything about them is geared towards the hot food stalls.  Traditional traders selling produce, clothes etc. cannot be too close to the hot food traders – it is hot, there is grease, there are smells.  So our traditional traders are left with the not-fit-for-purpose demountable stalls. The Council says that these demountable stalls are sufficiently robust to withstand the wind tunnel that is our Market Square.  But the trial stalls on the market are flimsy gazebos, not strong enough to ‘carry’ volumes of produce.  And bikes? Not a snowflakes!  

Nor do the Council’s proposals even recognise the needs of the Sunday market traders.  They certainly do not provide for them.  

What is under threat is our locals’ market.  What is needed is the investment for our market to continue serving local people.  We don’t want it to become merely a playground for tourists. 

If the Council’s proposals go ahead, Cambridge’s traditional market will be replaced by a mix of hot food and tourist-focused gazebos. The Council’s approach is driving vital and valued traders away, potentially depriving some of their livelihoods, and depriving Cambridge people of the produce, goods and services they provide. Some traders have already left. One of our 2 bike men is planning to leave.  And what a loss this service will be to a council that says it is trying to encourage people to ride their bikes.  And the rest of us…..?  Well….

The Council is tearing headlong towards a planning application this autumn, in just a few months....  This application will be for the Civic Quarter.  This will join at the hip proposals for the Guildhall and Corn Exchange, along with those for the Market. 

The proposals for the Guildhall and the Corn Exchange look reasonable.  Those for our market are not.   

We will lose our market if these proposals go ahead.   

Please sign our petition to demonstrate to our City Council that we do not want this to happen.