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This may include adverts from us and third parties based on our knowledge of you. More info × Group 28 Thank you for subscribing! We have more newsletters Show Me No thanks, close See our Privacy Notice A resident has said he will "fight tooth and nail" to oppose proposals to build a major city around a small village on the border of Cambridgeshire . As part of the new Labour government's plans to build 1.
5 million homes for the country, the village of Tempsford in Bedfordshire , around five miles south of St Neots, could see its population rapidly grow from about 600 to up to 350,000 people . If the town is built, it would be bigger than Cambridge or Oxford. Tempsford-born Joe Lawrence has warned of the prospect of the rural village being turned into a "monstrosity of a concrete jungle like Milton Keynes ".
Joe Lawrence, from Tempsford, said he dressed up as Jake Sulley from Avatar to "increase awareness of how the developers (ie the Sky People) are invading Pandora (ie, our beautiful rural existence)". (Image: Joe Lawrence) He says it would ruin the importance and strong historical context of the area, including its celebrated airfield where secret missions took place in the second world war . READ MORE: Drink driver caught on Cambridgeshire road for the third time in three years READ MORE: Developer sets out plans for more than 100 new South Cambs homes Think-tank UKDayOne recommended the region for house-building stating it has "limited environmental value" and highlighting the disused airfield as its most important feature.
Mr Lawrence said the publisher was "absolutely criminal" in its report and argued the environment was in fact important, both for harvests and mental health. He added: " They should be building in places where the infrastructure already exists. There are so many unoccupied homes in this country, and this needs to be addressed first before they destroy local villages like mine.
"What's going to happen in 100 years time when we've completely run out of space? It's just so idiotic and short-sighted." The new town would sit at the intersection of the existing East Coast Mainline and the planned East-West Rail (EWR) connecting Oxford and Cambridge. The existing village of Tempsford (Image: Google) Mr Lawrence continued: "We chose to live in a village - why can't people respect that? We are being treated abominably.
"If it was on the other foot, and city folk were told their buildings needed to be knocked down to make way for immediate agriculture and greenland, could you imagine the uproar? "We are petrified that life as we have known it is about to be turned upside down. We are rural folk- we love the smell of the countryside, the sound of silence, the beautiful views of mother nature. "Instead of this, it will be replaced by the smell of construction, the sound of diggers, and the views of pointless multi-bedroom houses.
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