Housing secretary Michael Gove wants to turn Cambridge until Britain’s version of Silicon Valley with the help of major investment in tech and housing, The Times reports.
Some 250,000 new homes would be constructed in two decades in the city, while land would be identified to build new business parks, laboratories and science centres.
In the process Cambridge’s population would surge from its current total of 150,000, while investment would spread around Oxford and Milton Keynes.
It’s thought civil servants have been tasked with coming up with plans for new railway lines, as well as potentially new tram and bus networks.
The plans are at an early stage in their development, while behind closed doors they are apparently being referred to as ‘Cambridge 2040’.
A source said: “It is basically large-scale growth, taking the local plan and putting it on steroids.
“The idea is that Cambridge becomes the Silicon Valley of Europe.”
Silicon Valley is an area in California known as the global centre of technology and innovation.
Gove is looking to remove some environmental restrictions in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill to make it easier to build new homes.
The government could also create a ‘hit squad’ of planning officials that would be sent to local authorities who lack the ‘capacity and capability’ to handle large planning applications.
