Moving to Cambridge

[Hillijx]

Advice please.....

Husband has just got a job in south Cambridge so we will be thinking of moving that way soon but we have no idea about the area. We are looking in south Cambridge, we want a village, rural, with at least the basic shops but nowhere large, good schools are a must?

Suggestions??

Hi Hillijx,
You could do worse than have a good read of other threads in this local section! It's a question that comes up quite a lot as there's plenty of movement into the area. Most of the schools are pretty good, really, so I'd consider the commute to work and how to make it bearable, then go from there.

Primary or secondary, by the way? And do you mean working in Cambridge itself, or the Addenbrooke's area, or outskirts/outlying villages (Hinxton/Babraham/Granta Park etc)?

Good luck with it all!

Thanks, will do that. We are pretty open but thinking south of Cambridge rather than in Cambridge itself, there are so many villages and don't know where to start. Currently need primary but as we will be staying put we will need decent secondary too.

Have a look at Sawston

Sawston has a lot going for it but I don't know if you'd say it's a small rural village. How rural are you after? The sort where you sit behind a tractor on the one road out of the place, or the more moderate, visible-farmland-but-good-transport-links, sort of rural?

If you need to get into Cambridge daily, it's a case of living on a bus/train route or picking your preferred traffic jam from most of the villages.

I like Stapleford, personally - again it's not that small, but it's quick enough to get to the train at Gt Shelford, the (slowish) bus into town or the off-road cycle route to Addenbrooke's. Shelford itself is lovely in many areas but tends to be expensive. Both places would give you Sawston Village College for secondary.

Other feeders for Sawston VC: Whittlesford is again a very appealing village and has a train station (can't offhand think of anyone we know with children at the school); Babraham has a lovely primary but not the shops you wanted; Duxford primary has lots of outdoor play space and is a good spot to watch the Red Arrows from the nearby air museum.

If you went a bit further south you could use Saffron Walden County High for secondary. Further west would give you Melbourn VC (Foxton, Shepreth and Meldreth areas feed into there and have stations) or Bassingbourn.

Bassingbourn and Sawston are about to become part of the same Multi-Academy Thingy, by the way. No idea what that will do to either!

Just be a bit careful if looking in the rural triangle south of the A505, where some places are apparently in a bit of a no-man's-land for secondary schools.

Linton and Abington are worth a look - good (half-hourly) bus route to town past the hospital, good primary in Abington or infant/junior schools and secondary in Linton (disclaimer: if you did read some of the earlier threads you'll know that my son hated it there - still a good school though!). Balsham is trickier for bus routes but good walking country, and again feeds into Linton Village College for secondary.

You didn't mention budget... any feeling for that and the type of property you'd want?

Thank you ting....this is a great help, we are going to do a drive around next weekend so this gives us a place to start. Secondary is still a few years off but don't want to be stuck in a house with no decent school nearby so we need to think long term. I am off to rightmove some of these places!!