Waterbeach Barracks and Airfield

Waterbeach is the result of a collaborative best practice approach to masterplanning and urban design. Its nature-led vision, embracing and reflecting the surrounding landscape, has shaped the development of new community and civic life, creating an exceptional place to live.
In August 2014, Urban&Civic Plc were appointed as Development Partner to DIO (Defence Infrastructure Organisation) to redevelop the 290 hectare former airfield and barracks site at Waterbeach in Cambridgeshire. BMD were commissioned by master-developer, Urban&Civic, to provide a combined landscape architectural and ecological service and have worked collaboratively with masterplanners Fletcher Priest Architects since the scheme's inception to develop the masterplan and submit the Outline Planning Application in 2018.
The airfield and barracks is an entirely brownfield site located on the northern edge of the historic village of Waterbeach. It has excellent transport links and lies just three miles from the Cambridge Science and Business Parks, home to some of the most dynamic employment generation in the world. Its location provides the setting for a modern, connected and highly sustainable location to live and work.
Sitting at the meeting point between the Western Claylands and Fenlands landscape character areas, the site is a gateway to the fens. With a man-made lake at its heart and historic links to the Scheduled monument of Denny Abbey in the north, the inherited features within the site, including extensive areas of existing grassland and woodland plantations, combine to form a rich ecological and heritage mosaic which have shaped the masterplan from the beginning.
BMD's pioneering nature led vision for Waterbeach, identified five key landscape design principles to underpin the evolution of the Waterbeach masterplan:
- Conserve and enhance inherited natural assets
- Integrate a ' wild infrastructure' mosaic for nature and wildlife to thrive
- Embrace the site's location as a gateway to the fens
- Create a new ' healthy infrastructure' network to ensure uninterrupted access to nature and reduced car dependency
- Restore long-lost historic links between Denny Abbey and neighbouring Waterbeach Village

A critical element of the project has been demonstrating how the site will achieve a net gain in biodiversity. The creation of four Biodiversity Priority Areas that harness the best of the site's existing assets were mapped, safeguarded and augmented to create rich and distinctive habitats at a macro scale, which are then linked through smaller scale interventions to provide an interconnected mosaic of habitat and space for wildlife and people, covering nearly 45% of the site and delivering a net gain in biodiversity.

The extensive green infrastructure framework, combined with the site's flat topography and adjacency to the city of Cambridge, formed the ideal setting for the creation of an exemplary pedestrian and cycle movement network. This has been designed in collaboration with local and county councils and a range of key stakeholders and cycle advocates to link the site with Waterbeach village in the south and the wider movement network, creating a fine grain of dedicated and shared cycleways.
Waterbeach started with the conservation and enhancement of a rich and biodiverse landscape to help shape a multifunctional, connected and vibrant new community. It's a scheme which seeks to promote social and healthy living as an integrated part of a nature led design, creating a long-term legacy and a unique place to live for both people and wildlife.