PLANS are expected soon to develop more than one million square feet (100,000m2) of employment land to provide workplaces for Huntingdon’s growing population.

St John’s College, Cambridge, owns large tracts of land in Huntingdon, including the Ermine Business Park, of the A141 Huntingdon bypass north of Spittals, which it is now planning to expand westwards towards Green End, Great Stukeley.

Huntingdonshire District Council planners say the landowner and its agent Savills have correctly identified the need for an environmental impact assessment to accompany such a large project when the planning application is eventually received, and they are now talking to statutory consultees, such as other councils, the Environment Agency and Natural England, to identify the scope of the EIA.

St John’s and Savills propose that the EIA should cover the project’s impacts on society and economy, transportation, ecology, ground conditions and groundwater, surface water and flood risk, agricultural land quality, air quality, noise and vibration, cultural heritage and archaeology, landscape and visual amenity.

The college envisages an application that includes offices and warehousing.

The area is part of 38 hectares of Greenfield land identified in HDC’s core planning strategy for employment use.