Further controversial options have emerged for linking a huge housing development at Wyton airfield with the A14 – and one would cut across common land on the outskirts of Hemingford Abbots.

While Cambridgeshire County Council still favours a new road between Hartford and Godmanchester (see panel below), it has not ruled out three other options, including one that would start on the A141 at Wyton-on-the Hill, pass to the west of Wyton, and cross the river to the Hemingfords to meet the A14.

Chairman of Hemingford Abbots Parish Council, John Peters, said he had not been aware it was an option until The Hunts Post contacted him on Monday.

“I have to say I am surprised as there is currently an application with English Nature to have the Ouse Valley, an area from Paxton Pits to Earith, recognised as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) and this will knock a big hole in that,” he said.

“The road will also be very close to Common Lane, so the homes at that end of the village are likely to be affected by noise and the inconveniences of living close to a major road.”

Martin Baker, conservation manager of Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Northamptonshire Wildlife Trusts added there was no environmentally acceptable route for a road across the river anywhere between Hartford and Hemingford Abbots.

“They’ve purely looked at it from a transport planner’s point of view. The environment is not being considered, it’s homes and transport driven.

“Huntingdonshire District Council says ‘We want this number of homes’ and the county council has a duty to look at the transport implications but neither of them, I would suggest, has considered the environmental impact of that decision.”

Cllr Ian Bates, who is the county councillor for the Hemingfords as well as CCC’s economy and environment committee chairman, said he would “keep a close eye on what was being suggested”.

As previously reported in The Hunts Post, the airfield at Wyton has been earmarked for 3,750 homes, but new roads are needed to cope with the expected traffic.

The most controversial of them to date has been a route from Hartford to Godmanchester, cutting through a nature reserve.

Other options are a St Ives northern bypass and a re-routed A1096 east of St Ives between the bridge and its junction with Marsh Lane.