The Knowhere Guide

Best and Worst in Cambridge, Cambridgeshire*

Cambridge, Cambridgeshire Triumphs and Tragedies

Favourite Building

• My House on Mill Road. Although i live in a dingy terraced house, there's no place thet feels more like home than a Mill Road house, where the streets are lightened with fresh and old faces! No prejudice or discrimination allowed, just people minding their business, unlike 'Albert Square'.
• My favourite tower without a doubt is the chimney towers of addenbrookes hospital. Tallest structure in Cambridge and all inspiring as the red warning lights on top shine for miles away, like glittering stars in the middle of the night!! And did you know all the drugs confiscated are burnt there so get yourself up there to get a free high.. be careful not to go up there when they are burning the deceased though...
• the ship pub arbury
• Newmarket Road end at Cambridge United.
• The University Library building, by the architect Gilbert Scott, who also built the Tate Modern, AND the old telephone box. This is an underrated building, whose appeal will grow with time. Okay, it is very 1920s/30s fascist architecture, but take a fresh look. It will age better than you might think.
• Kings college is pretty big
• grafton centre
• Fosters law faculty
• Queens' College. The bits you can see from Silver Street are really ugly, but over the Mathematical Bridge it's beautiful - 15th century cloisters, a really ornate chapel and so on. The best thing is that very few toursist realise that it's there.
• The Round Church; St Peter's Church by Kettle's Yard; the new Centre for Mathematical Studies on Clarkson Rd/Wilberforce Rd (it's like Star Trek)!
• My house and the Coop Building on Burleigh Street which stupid City Council are going to demolish - email them at planning@gov.cam.uk to stop it and hurl abuse
• Beautiful buildings everywhere, too many to choose from
• Definitely the Catholic Church in town - more gothic than Robert Smith and Siouxie Soux' love child!
• There's an awful lot of fantastic old architecture with the colleges and bridges. There's some not bad and some quite good new stuff too. I guess I prefer St John's College, the Mathmatical Bridge at Queen's, the Fitzwilliam Museum, Senat House, and of course, Kings' College Chapel. I can never decide if I like the Judge Institute or not... it's VERY brightly coloured and New, and defniitely.. creative architecture.
• Too many to name - one of the prettiest cities I've lived in.
• Emmanuel College Front Court and Chapel - C Wren Esq
• They're all pretty cool ... but if you're into strange architecture, check out the inside of the Judge Institute on Trumpington St
• Newnham College. Without a doubt. If you've never been, go and have a look. It's gorgeous.

Demolish It Now Building

• St. John's College.
• Cambrige United's Stadium
• the ship pub arbury
• park side swimming pool so they can build a huge skate park there.
• Where to begin? The Lion Yard, the Grafton centre, the police station, the lion yard car park, WHY OH WHY where such things allowed? They really mess up an otherwise beautiful city. Some people, still living, should be very, very ashamed. Oh, and all of the high street shops should be gutted, and allow smaller, friendlier and local retailers in.
• mcdonalds
• The Regal (pub)
• The DSS building - goes beyond ugly.
• Hills Road Sixth form college
• Demolish the whooolllleee grafton centre, except for maybe H&M and that cheapy star river jewelry place, the rest is suck-ass townie crap
• The Raised Faculty building on the Sidgwick site. Or Lion Yard.
• most of cambridges architecture!
• Lion Yard and Burwell's Court are pathetic; and while the town centre car parks behind Lion Yard and on Park St have their use, they are as ugly as sin.
• Has't been built yet but plans for old Philips site on York Street that mean 4 storey flats full of nonces at the end of my garden.
• That useless office block on the corner of Brooklands Ave and Hills Road - the one that was built about 15 years ago and never used.
• That bloody awful Napp laboratories building on the science park, you know the one that looks like a gaint toast rack.
• Lion Yard - for obvious reasons
• The UL (University Library). It's definitely the ugliest - and the least useful!
• Christ's College New Block, aka "The Typewriter" because it looks JUST like one *arrgh* New Hall College - Built ENTIRELY out of white concrete *eeep* The Judge Institute - It's very VERY garish!
• That ugly glass/metal eye-sore on the corner of Coldham's Lane and Newmarket Road !!
• Cambridge University Arms Hotel 1960s extension
• Most of Cambridge University.
• The coslett buiolding at A.P.U. Ugly 19 60's abortion.
• the "ugly new bit" in just about every college.

The Best Things

• Hoax skateshop, 2Seasons, Billys, Cult Clothing, Freespirit
• The Greens, The Pubs, Cambridge United FC,
• about Cambridge...The people...well most people!!
• has to be the ship pub arbury
• Fit birds in the summer (lots of) very nice place to live driving to the top level of the Grafton centre car park and coming down the spiral exit ramp in neutral and seeing how far you can go without braking. Cambridge Uunited. On a good day.
• mullets
• The laid back attitude, the market, Galloway and Porters, Brownes bookshop, The Backs in the spring, a punt and champagne, Nutroast in the Cambridge Blue, The bicycles everywhere on weekday mornings during college term. I don't like dissing tourists, as they bring good money, and they genuinely love the city. (who wouldn't?) so although sometimes they might wander in front of the bike or hover menacingly with a camera, just think how you feel when you are on holiday, and imagine how many drawers all over the world have photos of a grinning holiday maker, with you in the background!!
• cool people
• amount of drugs on the street
• The only good thing you can ever do in Cambridge is catch me visiting Corpus Cristi college armed to the teeth with the means to get even a first class honours degree student kicked out of uni, home and society in general...
• Its very safe
• Footlights mexican restaraunt, sense of unity, chilled evenings and less chilled evenings
• the fudge shop its so nice:)and the nice girls
• For such a small place, there's a lot more to do than you'd think. I love Mill Road, the coffee shops, the open spaces and fact that everywhere is within walking distance. And the swimming baths have a "health centre" that is fantastic for wasting a whole day in a jacuzzi for about £4.
• the skate culture, a lot of down to earth, phat skaters, especially the blokes who work in vert, i saw them just today PHHAATT!
• Sorry you all seem to hate the students - yes they can be a pain in the arse - I got knocked off my bike by a crowd of Japanese all moving in unison like a shoal of panicky fish, but, criminy, get into those pubs in summer and see the female students! I lived in Spain for a couple of years and I shagged more gorgeous hispanic babes in Cambridge than I ever did in Segovia. Its a lovely place. Greenery, pubs, river and amusing silly students when you've chilled out.
• Nice in the summer
• The mix of people; the range of music and theatre; the abundance of green space.
• Railway station - yes it's miles but Univ didn't want it in town when they built it; beating the GTI brigade with help of British land when they started racing near my house (motorbikes are much cooler anyway); lowest homeless rate in East Anglia - 20 people; Tony Barker who runs Jimmy's nightshelter; Mill Road Cemetery; adhoc city website for realising Cambridge is cool, PACT (Petersfield Area Community Trust; Friends of Mill Road Cemetery; Regal for being the best Weatherspoons in UK; living near the river; it's not Nottingham or Manchester so therefore loads prettier and the lack of clubs keeps it that way - you can't have everything so go drown in Ibiza - Stansteds just up the road
• Loads of places to lounge around and get pissed. Cows on some of the commons freaking the tourists out. Strawberry Fair. Lots of pubs - There are so many that when we once played pub golf (18 pubs, drink in each etc) we didn't even need to use the expensive town centre tosspot ones - at least I don't think we did, I can't remember much past pub 12, apart from being sick on Midsummer Common.
• ALL THE HOT CHICKS
• Can't really think of any, apart form there are plenty of books shops. Wetherspoons is nice as well
• Nadias Patisserie's cakes, punting on the Cam, summer evenings on the quayside, beautiful buildings, May Balls
• The wonderful architecture covering most of the last millenium, an endless amount of pretty 18 year old girls, Emmanuel College bar, Parker's Piece, King's, John's. Generally people here are friendly apart from the inverted snobbery shown towards students from people with a chip on their shoulder.
• The length of winter, the lack of nightlife, the fact that wherevever you go, there's a library next door!
• Although the townees may moan about all the students, the amount of young people gives Cambridge a young, lively and optimistic feel.
• The best thing about Cambridge is its size - it's a City that's town-sized. You can walk clean from one end to the other in a couple of hours. Lots of pretty cool pubs, lots of winding alleys and side-streets with curious hidden shops.
• It is wonderfully easy to get from one place to another.
• The best thing about Cambridge is the wide range of visual arts on offer for such a small city. The Fitzwilliam has old European masters, as well as some Modernist works. Kettles Yard has exhibitions of contemporary art (often obscure installations, but also such delights as carvings in the Modernist tradition of "truth to materials". The Cambridge Darkroom has photographic exhibitions and the University Museum of Anthropology has a world-famous collection of non-Western art/artefacts. And the worst thing about the city? Quite possibly a general air of snobbery emanating from those dreaming spires; but without those spires there would be no cultural facilities of note in Cambridge.
• It's near Grantchester Meadows - worth the trip, especially if you're a Pink Floyd fan. If you like pub culture and decent ale, you'll love Cambridge. Lots of sexy foreign students are a big bonus!
• The great mix of people and the air of excitment at the start of the two University terms.
• Strawberry fair - 25 years old and the highlight of the year, drugs, booze and dancing shoes, it's a free event that happens every year. Bit like a one day feastival. loads of people there, and not many barrys, so everyone gets pissed and get along
• This is a place to chill ... only those who don't have this gift find petty little pleasantries like foreign students or students irritating.
• For students, May Week. Everything is close to everything else, and its less than an hour from London. Punting and getting drunk and falling in the river Playing frisbee or football on midsummer common When students and cambridge residents get on with each other, they tend to find they quite like each other. the river Oddbins on Kings parade
• Hello! I'm a foreign student who have visited Cambridge recently. I'm very sorry to read that British students can't stand the foreigns! I do have to say that I love Cambridge most because of the British people. You are really great with foreign students!!!! Moreover, I can really say that Cambridge people are not cold - as the Brithsh stereotype. I hope you can change your mind concerning students from all over the world who love your little city!!!!
• Wretched mini-malls in centre of town.
• I was born in Cambridge, and I am currently a student in Cambridge. The worst thing about Cambridge is the bloody foreign students, all cycling around in groups of around 100, taking up both sides of the road. The best thing about Cambridge is the British students who were born in Cambridge or the surrounding area (excluding the students from the Purse School, who are a bunch of toffie nosed arseholes). The Cambridge people are cool, and really know how to party. They also know how to make the best out of really boring city, where there is nothing to do, (except kill the foreign students, all cycling around in groups of around 100, by running them over in your car). Long Road sixth form college is the best college there, and it is a babe fest all year round.
• Cambridge is a superb place. Mainly because it is only 15 miles south of Britain's finest city, Ely. Ely is paradise, an oasis of excellence, it is the Nexus. And everyone who lives therein is enlightened. Cambridge is also fantastically flat which annoys climbers etc. Fucking great, get another hobby you silly sods.
• I'm a student at the University, and I went to crap state schools in Manchester. And my Dad digs up roads for a living. But I also agree that there are far too many posh wankers around, whether they went to public school or are rich or whatever. Without cars, tourists, posh twats, arseholes who drive in circles around Market Square of a Saturday night, strong winds and haircuts at six quid plus, Cambridge would be a great place.
• There are lots of cars everywhere and they aren't going to go away so get used to it. Many's the time I've seen cyclists riding along at night with no lights on or going the wrong way around a roundabout. Anyway what happened to all the green bikes:-)
• Dear me, "the best and the worst" section seems to have brought out people's worst prejudices.
  Fact: a tiny minority of the students "went to some top public school", and less than half went to any public school. And even if they did, that doesn't make them "pretty damn sad". Do you really want to let ignorant prejudiced fools clutter up your Web pages with such drivel?
  The worst thing about Cambridge is in fact not the buses (which are pretty bad) but the cars. There's just too much traffic, and 95% is the cars!
• I'm at Anglia University in Cambridge, and although the place can be a pain in the arse (mainly for the reasons outlined: arsehole students, crap buses, fenland breezes, etc) it's also a pretty cool place in its own chilled out way. The thing is, you just have to know how to avoid the Cambridge university tossers.

The Worst Things

• McDonalds, all the trendy shops and Cambrige Uniteds stadium
• University Students, Foreign Language Students, Anything to do with the university really.
• anywhere thet isnt the ship pub arbury
• Expense, house prices, lack of decent clubs, clueless foreigners on bikes with no knowledge of basic UK traffic laws (i.e which side of road to ride on, A red light means stop etc.
• pedestrian types
• As I said before, high street shops. IF WE WANT THEM, WE WILL JUMP ON THE TRAIN TO LONDON. Bradwell's court, Starbucks, all of the shops on Pety Cury. The Lion Yard. (who allowed that monstrosity to be built?) The enormous amount of people begging. The Rat and Parrot. (which makes me want to drown a significant amount of Cambridgeshire's population for the good of mankind) The lack of decent B and B or cheap hotel accomodation for visitors.
• gets dark early in winter?
• Arbury is full of poofs who think its hard. its a nice estate compared to most places
• security, cocky residents [we live in this town, dont you know, so stay off our pavements or we'll call the police] and a distinctive lack of fun to be had
• the barrys,etc not liking me and my mates
• The Regal. Not being able to walk past it on a Friday or Saturday night without abuse.
• I'm comming to APU next september and I hope I'll have a great time. I don't know about all the other foreign students but you don't have to worry, Im not a nerd who don't know how to party. Here in Belgium I studied for three years in a very multicultural enviroment (Leuven) and I never experienced any problems. What I don't understand is why students from APU and Uni. of Cam. hate eachother?
• If you don't want to go via London, it takes bloody ages to get there from the north by train, even when they're working. I could walk faster.
• Don't enjoy student abuse really - I know lots of University students these days aren't exclusively public school wankers BUT... I used to work in a well known bookshop in town. Students win books sometimes which they claim from this shop and just have to inform the person at the desk which college they go to. One bloke when asked which college he was from, waved his college scarf in my mates face and said "don't you know?..." I also had to chuck somebody out for browsing the shop in his dressing gown one morning. If I have to get up for work, the least you can do is get dressed before descending from your rooms at Trinity...!
• the barry's, old people, and kiddy skaters who know no fear!
• We're not there in the summer! Full of cambridge tossers No real nightclub with top quality music
• the Arbury estate. enough said.
• People in Cambridgeshire who think Arbury is hard. It is fuckall to Glasgow, Liverpool, Moss Side and Grangetown. It would be paradise to any northern people.GAZZ.
• Foreign students and visitors should bear in mind that people who live in Cambridge usually want to get from A to B without wading through an obstructive crowd of ill-coordinated non-English-speaking tourists. Residents should consider that the town /is/ worth standing around and looking at, many roads often look deceptively like pedestrianised zones if you're unfamiliar with the place, and we probably do the same irritating stuff anyway when we go on holiday. Camb. Univ. students should sigh and realise that loud Pitt Club (society for people who went to prestigious public schools) and drinking society members are always going to get them a bad name, and counter this by being polite and considerate to residents and not joining the dumb drinking societies. They should also get bike lights, and admit that residents have a point about all the May Balls.
• Being kept awake by tossy students in May Ball Week (in June...duh?) who ban half the guided tours for the rest of the year because they need to study - we work you know as well; porters who lie when you ring them up about said Balls; people who dont' appreciate the beauty of the City and moan about lack of clubs (go to Stanstead etc etc); developers; too many rented houses in residential areas full of inconsiderate people
• The bloody house prices - my boyfriend was born and bred in Cambridge and we had to move to bleedin Bedfordshire to find a house when we wanted to buy one (I'm not saying which town because it's too embarassing).
• I have lived here all my life and I hate it. I hate the students as they are all a bunch of tossers, I hate they way everthing is biased towards students. I hate the fact that everone 'normal' or 'ordinary' is ignored by the city council.
• Way too many tourists cluttering up the place!
• All the Barrys if you're anywhere near the town centre in the evening. The whole city is owned by the University, which makes it impossible for puba and clubs to get music licences, or late bars etc, so unless you like commercial dance music you're not gonna like it here. Extreme lack of music venues accordingly, hence no "scene" as such, hardly any good bands, nothing for bands to aim towards.
• Expensive clubs(on weekends), tossers in 205 GTi's shouting at anyone who appears to be a student, the Regal (why anyone queues to go to this dive is beyond me).
• I never thought myself prejudiced, but a lot of Cambridge students are completely intolerable - significantly more obnoxious than any other place I have been. Driving and parking in Cambridge are terrible - forget it. Catch a Park & Ride. Housing prices are pretty crappy, and there are far too many grey concrete boxes jostling for space amongst the other somewhat prettier buildings. Cambridge needs more trees and parkland. Cambridge is pretty much devoid of things to do. I mean, one mainstream cinema in a whole city? Only one half-decent club in the town centre? Thank goodness for pubs. No decent rock venues in Cambridge.
• Foreign tourists & university students everywhere, people who go punting, no decent clubs, traffic around the city centre.
• Bloody tourists EVERYWHERE.
• The homeless capital of the country. More hostels run by more charities with more money than sense. Mind you the salaries some of these "charity workers" are on makes me think I should get into the homeless business.
• Most of the views above are quite extreme, the truth is somewhere in the middle of them all.
• The worst things are the preconceptions and the misconceptions about Cambridge: there is a lot to do if you ask around and are willing not to be too trendy. The best clubs are of course in London. As for "Cambridge tossers" and "top public schools", well if you're not prepared to accept that small, minority of Cambridge society, you might aswell go elsewhere. WE are in fact quite normal and contribute a lot to the community and nightlife. We manage to have a good time and are happy to welcome ANYONE else to do the same. The foreign students, by the way, are OK: Where would Thursday night at Fifth Avenue be without them?
• The bloody cars ... keep them out. If you feel like visiting (which you really should - it's great), please don't bring your car any further than the park and rides which now surround the city.
• Kings' College Porters. Rude, arogant, and stupid.
• How on earth can the buses be the worst things? - 95p for a 5 minute journey? Why don't you walk if it's that short a trip, you fat jabber. Oh, and yeah, all the stupid bunches of no hopers from Anglia who think Cambridge students are posh geeky tossers, and also those stupid posh geeky tossers who think the guys from Anglia are a stupid bunch of no hopers - anyone who thinks like that - get a life, 'cos we don't need this crap.
• For non-students, not knowing what May Week is. The tourists the tourists the tourists The train station is fucking miles away When cambridge people assume all students are stuck up wankers with more money than sense ok some of them are but not all - most of the students don't like the wankers any more than you do, so relax a bit. The retired American tourists The small identikit French schoolkids who descend on Kings Parade out of the sky by the thousand.

The Knowhere Guide started out as a list of places to skateboard in the UK. It is a compilation of (unedited) information and views supplied by users like yourself. It is not a conventional tourist guide!

In most cases, the information in each section has been submitted by more than one contributor (the credits at the bottom of the page list some, but not all, of the contributors) and some of it dates back to the 1970s.

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Last updated: 2008-05-09