Regenerating the Grafton Centre
New Hotel
Cambridge needs new hotel rooms to support the local economy, supporting jobs and academic institutions by allowing more visitors to stay in the city for tourism, leisure, businesses, and conferences.
Premier Inn will open a new hotel on East Road.
The former bus turning circle on East Road will be turned into a new public plaza outside the hotel, with green planting and seating.
Greener Streets
Instead of an indoor shopping centre, part of the west end of the centre will be turned into a new public space called Fitzroy Square, with a new shopping street called Gold Lane linking to Burleigh Street.
Attractive architecture and lighting, along with lots of new trees and planters, will make this into a nicer environment for people visiting the shops and cafes. There will be opportunities for public events, outdoor dining, and pop-ups.
The proposals will be at the forefront of sustainable design, going beyond national and local sustainability policy requirements. For example, new green roofs and tree planting will create a net gain in the biodiversity value of the site of 649%. Staff will be encouraged to arrive at work by bike, with over a thousand secure and visitor cycle parking spaces across the regenerated centre.
The Grafton Centre in Cambridge is changing.
The shopping centre was built in the early 1980s, and despite renovation works it went through a period of decline as anchor stores like Debenhams have closed down nationally and the way people shop has changed. The number of empty shops has increased year on year.
Despite this, people still value the Grafton Centre, whether for its specialist and independent stores, value retail, or a local place to meet friends for a coffee.
So in 2023, Pioneer Group proposed a new vision to turn the centre around. Retail would be concentrated at the west end of the centre within a nicer shopping environment and improved streets. The east part of the centre will become new laboratory space for life science research start-ups and businesses, ensuring that 2,000 employees are present on a daily basis to support local shops and cafes.
The planning application was approved by Cambridge City Council in February 2024, and work is now ongoing to deliver this ambitious regeneration plan.
Lab Space
The east side of the shopping centre will be converted into laboratory and office space for start-ups, small businesses, and established companies in the science and technology industry. This will include incubator space to support the growth of small and start-up companies.
This will provide more than 2,000 jobs, from apprentice and entry level to PhD.
The mall’s former concourse will be transformed into event space for public lectures, conferences, and displays and exhibitions about the innovative work being done by researchers here.
Pioneer Group run life science and tech-focused locations in eleven cities across the UK, all beautiful spaces to work from with science at their core. As well as high-quality laboratory and office space, Pioneer Group deliver investment, accelerator programmes, scale-up training, and connections to esteemed figures from the world of science and technology.
Improved Retail
Retail will remain a significant activity in the centre, complementing and supporting the shops on Fitzroy and Burleigh Street.
We aren’t looking to compete with the Grand Arcade and Lion Yard for expensive retail – we want to provide shops and cafes that offer real value and convenience for our neighbouring community.
A loop of shops and cafes will connect the retail retained at the western end of the centre to Grafton Street and Burleigh Street, creating new active frontages, retail units, and public space. The improvements to the environment here will make this a nicer place to visit, shop, work, and spend time.
