Anyone regret moving to southwest/west Cambridgeshire?

[Busymummy50]

We are thinking of moving from London to west/southwest Cambridgeshire. Anyone made the move from city to village life and regretted it? Would also like to hear the positives too.

Downsides will be commute and cost of commute plus not too reliable trains in bad weather if you need to go back to London to work. Less employment opportunities and lower pay than London. Rest is better.

Does depend what you do / where you work. Large town maybe less of a shock. I spent a lovely 2 years round there but had to move back closer to London for work, it was taking almost 2 hours each way door to door. If it wasn't for work I would move back to a larger town.

It is important to visit too - we went to one place where the only social activity appeared to be a knitting club where the average age was about 80.

Love it here. We’ve brought up our kids here since 2005.

They are teens now and it’s the friendliest place I’ve lived.
It’s expensive but the state schools are very good.

I’m in a village in sw Cambridgeshire

Can you be any more specific about location (and likely work locations)? Difficult to advise otherwise.

Looking at Comberton for the secondary school. We looked at cambourne but wasn't keen on the new build houses. I would end up giving up work so no commuting for me but partner would need to commute to London by car a few days a week which could become a problem for him. Like comberton as close to school and has bus service to cambourne and cambridge. Not sure if any activities or thing a going on for me or kids. I'm quote quiet so happy to be in a quiet village but not sure how kids would be as they get older. In London public transport is so convenient and it's so easy to get around!

Kids love swimming so will miss having a choice of 3 local pools within easy access.

Sorry for all the text mistakes! Using my phone and not as easy as the computer! Predictive text

Ah -- I would prefer to live in London than Cambridge. I find that is a hard town to live in with kids and TWO professional parents. It seems to be geared up for one stay at home parent. We live very close to the city - Trumpington - but everything shuts at 6pm and we have barely finished work. The bus service is dreadful and we frequently go to Westfield Mall in Stratford City to shop rather than Cambridge to the bad traffic, expensive parking and early closing times. We have also found it difficult socialise with the groups. Comberton is a great school but I think I would prefer Cambourne for the atomspher. Yes the new house are bland in Cambourne but Cambourne seems to have a good community spirit. Certainly we have found that they have much more than where we are.

A lot of people love Cambridge. But as I said I find it very difficult and that is after almost 6 years living here

Op. My teens are in Comberton Village College. Yr 9 and yr 12.
Pm me if you have questions.

Cambourne:

• still feels new, and more housing growth to come
• new facilities coming forward, inc. swimming pool
• a lot of people very motivated to make it work as a community
• isolated by public transport atm but a significant (controversial) improvement planned

Comberton:

• established, looks less "raw'
• isolated by public transport, much less chance of the situation improving
• good butchers, not so sure about other local shops etc

Both have about the same number of residents now, but Cambourne is set to double - that should increase local resources but it certainly won't feel village-y.

We live in Bourn and our kids went to Comberton. They survived teenage years living in a rural area,although you find yourself becoming a bit of a taxi service at times. We used to drive them to the point where they coukd get the Citi 4 bus from Cambourne to Cambridge so it's not too bad.

Its just been confirmed that Cambourne is getting a public swimming pool.

Most of the villages round here are quite friendly.

We made the move from London a few years ago, to be somewhere safer and better for the kids as they move into the teenage years. For this, the move has been successful and I don't regret it.

For everything else, I agree with Londo. Access to Cambridge is difficult and we also often end up going to London to get things done because it's actually easier. And I have definitely not found it a friendly atmosphere, more like nobody is happy to interact with anybody they are not related to. I live in a traditional village not that far from Londo, so maybe the southern regions are the ones to avoid.

Not sure why you would move to this expensive part of the country if one of you isn't working in Cambridge? We live close by (north Herts) and the main draw of the area is if you have one parent working in London and the other in Cambridge, then it's reasonably convenient for both. But if you're going to be an SAHP there must be other options better value and at least as nice?

We live just north of Cambridge on the train route to London - about 1hr 10 mins, and 6mins into Cambridge. My OH works in London and I work in Cambridge. Cambridge is nice, expensive, public transport is expensive and not great in some parts. Comberton school is supposed to be v good, I personally wouldn’t want to live in Cambourne but there are a lot of facilities that the small villages don’t have

FraterculaArtica, We are thinking of moving to the other side of London or cambridgeshire. London area is more expensive and we looked at villages in s and west if Cambridge and we could get a bigger house than London especially in cambourne. Because of the driving commute for my partner, we cannot go too far out of London and Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire or Essex is our closest. There are good schools in Hertfordshire too but the areas we looked at and research we did, we weren't as keen as Cambridgeshire.

Good schools and safety for our kids as they get older is our main priority. And comberton seems to fit.

did you get my message Busymummy?
I hope it helped

OP we're about to buy a house in Hardwick and went to look round Hardwick primary today. I was impressed.

We did consider Cambourne. Feel free to message me if you want to compare notes, especially info on the secondaries. I'm originally from Cambridgeshire and trying to move back the area I've been priced out of!

SG29. Thanks. I thought I be out on limb on my own. We got our daughter into a great school so we will be staying as well for now. I work in London and the commute is getting worse. Especially after the new train station was added. They having worked out yet. Interesting I would the people in London are friendlier that Cambridge. They are in a rush but they will talk to you and smile at time. Never seems to happen once I get home