Cambridge village or stay put on London borders?

[HazelnutCookies]

Hi All, advice would be much appreciated please and sorry for the long post - we’ve seen a house we love - we were not looking for a move right now particularly, though we do want more of a country way of life in next few years but we’ve come across this house now. The house is in a village just outside Cambridge. We would have to drive to Cambs North for the station. Currently we live on London borders in a nice area and can commute from door to door within an hour on the tube (walk to station, no waiting for trains etc). We have a nice (big enough for us) detached house within a 5 min walk to prep school where DC1 is very happy but we have a small garden and secondary school options here are not great, also there are areas near here where the teen culture is not great. We would be otherwise making a move in 3 or so years for our country move. I’m craving more of a villagey / country way of life. Currently my 2 are under 5 at moment so don’t have to worry about secondary/teen years for a little while. The house we like has a very big plot, loads of outside space, the house is bigger but probably doesn’t offer a great deal more than ours now (much bigger rooms but same number IYSWIM). It’s in a village - total lifestyle change. Love the Cambs area for having the river, National Trust nearby, not too far for a day trip to norfolk coast etc. However do you think the difficulties of the commute to London (me 1/2 days a week, hubby 3/4) - prob 1hr 45 door to door - and the journey to the school we would send them to (up to 40 mins one way in traffic unless we send them on the school bus, which would probably be what we would do eventually as it would solve the problem) would just outweigh any positives of the move? I love Cambridge as a city and the surrounding villages are beautiful. I worked in Cambs a long time ago and at the time I wasn’t ready for it as it was such a contrast to London but now with a family and having different priorities, it seems much safer than here for kids and also day to day life at home (everyone has CCTV, alarms etc.). Are we looking at things with rose tinted glasses here or should we take the plunge and make the move?

Those commutes for both of you plus the drive to school with two young children would be too much for me, why not keep looking but in the area close to your preferred school so at least that travel time is removed

That commute sounds awful to me. I guess it depends how often you’ll have to do it. On the days you do, you won’t see much of your kids if you do a full working day in London. Plus a long commute turns into a nightmare as soon as you get an issue on the trains.

Only you can decide what your priorities are. What works for one person doesn’t work for another.

I wouldn't do those commutes, the half hour (on a good day, hour on a bad day) I drive to the other side of Cambridge is enough for me.
But then I wouldn't want to live in London either, or Cambridge tbh - I've just sort of ended up here.
What village and which school? Commenting into Cambridge itself isn't much fun.

I think you'd be crazy to move with those commutes and school travelling times. I imagine those door to door times are when there are no issues as well so train/motorway issues to London could turn into a multiple hour journey. I couldnt do that when you are throwing school drop offs and pick ups into the mix as well. Just more unwanted stress. You actually sound really happy where you are as well so can't see the benefit

If you and DH can control your working days so that one of you is always in Cambs, that could work. Or if either/both of you could change employment and work in Cambridge.

It sounds like that is the direction you want to go, and often there isn't a perfect family timing to change, you can make this workable.

But two parents commuting to London probably isn't it, unless you have family or good friends there who would agree be your emergency 'pick up this vomiting child now ' contact

I was brought up in a village around there (wonder which one you are looking at). It was lovely growing up but the village was small, my parents had to drive us round Cambridge to see friends etc. There were 3 busses a day to Cambridge and the school commute was 40 mins each way. So my parents spent lots of the day in the car. The traffic in Cambridge was dreadful but think they've improved it now.
I live in London now and everyone I know lives nearby, the traffic is ok and school is nearby. I think of the amount of taxi ing my parents had to do and I couldn't do it. But I do look fondly back (even though I wished I had lived somewhere more dynamic at the time!). Not sure if I could make that move now though.

I lived in Cambridge itself for a while, not too far from the main Cambridge station.

I quite liked Cambridge itself, although once you live there you do start to discover that there's a kind of invisible separation between the university and the town. There's a lot of interesting cultural stuff that goes on, for example, that is only open to university students and staff.

But the commute to London drove us both mad after about six months. And we were very close to the station (at the Cambridge end).

You will find that whoever is doing the most commuting in your case your DH by the sounds of it will have an utterly miserable time and will likely ultimately regret the decision to move.

What I tended to find is that there was a massive scramble to get seats on the King's Cross trains in the mornings. Literally pushing and shoving. The train then filled up even more at Royston, with people standing in the aisles and around the doors. It was no better than London commuter trains really, and very uncomfortable.

Likewise on the way home -- as soon as the Cambridge train was announced there would be this crazy rush to get on it and get a seat.

A delay to the trains would knock out a whole evening. Even when things were running well I would seldom get home before 8pm. (I would finish work at 5.30, but then have to get to KGX which could take up to 45 minutes, and if I missed the one convenient train I'd be waiting 30 minutes for the next one.)

I started getting the Liverpool Street trains, even though that meant a 20-minute longer journey and an inconvenient half-hour bus ride at the London end, because the trains were newer and more comfortable, and the rush to get on them at Cambridge was less intense.

I really, really wouldn't recommend it. I thought I'd be fine with the commute ooh I'll get loads of reading done, I thought but the reality was cramped, uncomfortable and hot trains, jam-packed with other miserable commuters like me, feeling slightly sick all the way because the trains rattle along quite fast between Royston and London but they rock side to side quite a lot on the rails. As I say the Liverpool Street trains were slightly better but were more subject to delays and cancellations for some reason.

Bear in mind they also discourage car parking at both Cambridge train stations now. In fact I'm not sure there's much of a car park at Cambridge -- what used to be the car park when I lived there is now the (very nice) Tamburlaine Hotel.

Plus it was so expensive -- the train season ticket was over £5,000 a year and that was five years ago.

Small villages are great for small children but older children want to meet with friends from school and they are far and wide. I know from experience!

Why Cambridge? Your commute would be much shorter in Bucks, Berkshire or Herts. Maidenhead will get the Elizabeth line. We have glorious countryside too! Oxford isn’t far from west Bucks and you have the Chiltern hills across several counties and The Thames too in the south. The big bonus would be a 35 minute commute (Or less) from lots of stations. Plenty of stunning villages too!

The traffic in Cambridge was dreadful but think they've improved it now.

I've lived in one of the villages for 20 years, the traffic just gets worse and worse - although the A14 improvements are good.

Maybe they've diverted the traffic somewhere else!! The main road between the station and town seemed very quiet last time I went! I used to sit on that road in traffic every day!
Also when I grew up there there was one one screen cinema and no bowling alleys etc so life was a bit boring. Now it seems much better and lots to do and very desirable.
But yes the commute as well. My dh commutes to London from where we live. It takes an hour due to slow train/dlr from where we live. But if all goes tits up he can get a taxi home. Or even walk if he had to!! But the thought of both being 60 miles from
Home and the trains not working fills me with dread. I would need to make sure one of us was reachable every day.

That commute would be unbearable for me, such a big chunk of the day. I lived in Cambridgeshire for years, mainly in the South villages, but also North for a while and you should think carefully about the impact the level of traffic will have. Getting anywhere between about 7.30 and 9.30 and 3.30 and 6ish is an absolute nightmare. It was only when I moved that I realised not everywhere grinds to a halt twice a day. Cambridge had the worst congestion in the entire country a couple of years ago, not sure if it still does, but it wont have changed much I suspect.

I had a different but just as long commute at the start of my career and there’s no way I’d do that now I have kids unless I had someone at home doing all the pick-ups etc, and I say this as someone who has lived in Cambridge and really loves it. Re the reference to teen culture ... you might find that bored teens in the countryside are every bit as tricky in their own way and will find just as many things to get up to that you’ll find undesirable. If you move for that reason you might find yourself disappointed.

I lived in Cambridge and traffic can be bad, but depends what time you're coming into the city. From what you've said I would think it's either bottisham direction or Histon direction. I got the train from Cambridge north to kings cross (when I opened, I used to use the main station) and it was empty in the mornings on the 7.28. But was rammed when Cambridge lot got on. There is quite a lot of parking which is largely unused from what I saw. Like pp said the return journey was very busy! The 5.10pm was very difficult to get a seat on. I regularly sat on the floor!
Cambridge is a fab city though, especially in the summer.

Forgot to say that with your commute I'd recommend going south west cambs, towards Royston, so Melbourn, foxton or bassingbourn.

I think Cambridgeshire and countryside are lovely but not practical with those commute times.

We made a similar move which worked really well but with almost no commuting, children walk 5 mins to school, husband works 8 mins drive away, I largely stopped working and the extra time we have back as a family is part of what makes it work for us. So would either look at somewhere closer to London or look at moving jobs / schools to shorten commute if that's an option.

Thanks so much everyone for your thoughts, very interesting to read everyone’s experiences. General consensus seems to be that the commute is not practical on such a regular basis and the school journey does sound like a nightmare especially compared to how easy things are for us now. I may have the option to WFH permanently and not commute at all but it’s not clear yet, but DH will probably still be doing a large amount of commuting which would mean that all the childcare would fall in my direction. My mum would be moving too so would be on hand for the “sos please collect your vomiting child” scenario. Sounds like we need to think more about working arrangements before contemplating a move like this. Really appreciate hearing everyone’s experiences!