Eco town crisis in Cambridge

Plans for a controversial eco town near Cambridge could be shelved after the main landowner this week refused to sell to developers.

Medical research charity the Wellcome Trust pulled out of proposals to allow building of an environmentally-friendly community on the 270 acres of land it owns on the Hanley Grange site.

Developers Jarrow Investments will now have to reassess the scheme, which they had already put to the government.

Cambridgeshire county councillor Matt Bradney has welcomed the news, saying: "This represents a major blow to the plans for an eco town at Hanley Grange as it reduces the land by a third. It is amazing that this ill thought out proposal has got as far as government without having the landowners signed up."

The Cambridge project is the latest in a series of proposed eco town initiatives that have fallen through in recently months, leading many homeowners looking for green properties to consider self build options instead.

Elsewhere, opponents of a proposed eco town in Norfolk have sought to step-up their campaign. Paul Thomas told the Norfolk Eastern Daily Press that he was setting up a meeting at which he hoped to get locals better organised and motivated.