Mumsnet guides to Manchester, Bristol, Cambridge, Milton Keynes and Hitchin - your views?

[KateMumsnet]

Hello everyone

We've been busy creating the first batch of our local guides, aimed at families who are thinking about moving to a new area. So far we've covered Bristol, Manchester, Cambridge, Milton Keynes and Hitchin - we'd love to hear what you think, so if you've got a minute have a look and let us know if we've missed the mark on anything, or left out a crucial piece of info.

If you're a local yourself, any insider tips you can share - especially about schools or buying/renting a family home - would be much appreciated .

You left out East Manchester.

I've just read the Bristol page. Just a technicality - Keynsham is not actually in Bristol (despite having Bristol postcodes and area dialling codes) . It comes within the Bath and North East Somerset local authority, not the City of Bristol local authority.

Eek auntiebasil - we'll get that fixed. Thanks too MrsMoastyToasty - likewise.

I would say Milton Keynes is spot on with what's been put! I love it here

The Manchester guide makes no mention of the sizeable Jewish community. That's quite an omission given the history of the city.

That too @wowfudge . It's like only Altrincham exists. And Altrincham isn't Manchester. Really skewed towards monied Cheshire.

I know - it's problematic: everything education-related revolves around Trafford because of its grammar schools and other perfectly good areas are completely neglected. Media City isn't technically in Manchester, it's in Salford, which gets totally overlooked btw and those people with no real life knowledge of the area think it's all dodgy! Not everyone is a middle-class Hale wannabe.

Huge university city too - don't remember seeing that mentioned.

In the Cambridge article - you state "The Perse School (14th)" . What does the 14th indicate?

You are brave to say the Lowry and "the Quays" are in Manchester....

Hitchin one. It's a good, accurate guide. Just a few minor quibbles. The estimated house prices for the Bearton region are a bit off. A 3-bed semi would be a lot less than £650,000 on average. Flints has closed down. The Secret Garden Cafe is actually the Garden Gate Cafe.

@Unescorted - nah, just plain wrong.

As a non-Manc now living in the city, I think including Salford and other surrounding areas in a definition of Manchester is fair enough.

People reading the article probably want a general feel for Manchester and omitting Salford because it's a separate city, wouldn't be helpful.

zampa the area is Greater Manchester. It would be the same as saying Bradford was Leeds when you mean to refer to West Yorkshire.

My point is that many people conflate Salford with Manchester (the city), seeing as there's only a couple of miles the two. I'm not saying it's right.

Cambridge article:

You state the train links between Cambridge and Peterborough as a plus point. However, Cambridge is not on the Peterborough line; you cannot go direct from one to the other. Not the quick and easy transport link you suggest!

Regarding things to do with kids in town, you might want to mention the libraries. Central Library has recently refurbished the children's library section, and has a regular timetable of free activities for children. My children insist on a trip to library every time we go, it's lovely.

Thanks so much everyone - we'll have a look at all the points you raise, and we'll keep an eye on this thread if anyone else has anything to add?

So what is the deal with these guides? Are they going to be accompanied by advertising in the future eg from estate agents in the locality? Where did the copy come from? Because I've just read the Cambridge profile and it doesn't mention the most important of the negative issues which come up time and again on the Local board - traffic congestion. It is pointless to purport to offer objective advice to someone looking to relocate to Cambridge or its environs without drawing their attention to quite how dreadful the traffic is. Makes me wonder whether these are anything more than puff pieces with some kind of commercial tie up.

Oh, and, any article supporting the myth that Cambridge has a functioning bus service isn't worth reading.

On the Manchester article, it's Bowdon not Bowden. And I agree with posters about that Greater Manchester is completely different to Manchester. Parts of Salford are less than a mile from Manchester City Centre, hence the usual lumping of everything together but as set out above you should explain the geography a bit better.

I’d agree with PPs about the Manchester/Greater Manchester confusion, but I see the problem. The whole of Greater Manchester is far to big a topic for a single guide, but to address just the City of Manchester without mentioning Old Trafford or Salford Quays would be a bit odd.

I’m puzzled by the omission of the Manchester Museum - the tropical frogs and the Egyptian mummies seem to be one of the most popular family trips on our (frequent) rainy weekends.

A small thing, Catfish Kids in Chorlton closed down a few weeks ago (it’s now a hipster record store). Their Burnage branch may still be open, but I don’t know.

@evilgiraffe There is a direct train between Cambridge and Peterborough it goes all the way to Birmingham, although it’s not quick and as a lot of stops.

Is there really? You'd have to have no other choice to use it, I guess. It must take ages. Thanks :)

You might want to check the details on train times, there's been a bit of a change recently...

In fact as there isn't a functioning timetable in 4 of those places your information is already out of date and will be out of date on a daily basis!

Did you do any fact checking at all or just pull dated comments from local talk? Few quick criticisms on Cambridge.

Houses on Latham, Chaucer and Newton Road rarely come on market as a quick look at any of the sold property price index things will tell you. And by healthy budget you mean £1.5million at a minimum. Might not be the average mumsnetters idea of healthy.

The Phoenix school closed down a while ago which makes me wonder how current the rest of the school info is.

Only Midsummer house has a Michelin star. Alimentum lost its star last year. Cotto has never had one.

All this info is so easy to confirm that it makes me think the whole guide must be inaccurate and therefore worthless to anyone using it to help make informed decisions.

And as a PP said you really need to talk about the traffic. Clearly lots of people do drive in / out of Cambridge and the roads are clogged meaning the bus service at peak times is also slow.