New Cambridge bar owner insists ‘not opening a nightclub’ after neighbours raise noise fears

The owner of a new cafe and bar due to open in Cambridge said he is not “setting up a nightclub” after facing backlash from neighbours. Matthew Taylor said he wanted The Alcademy to be a ‘community hub’ offering tours, plays, classes, and film showings alongside the cafe and bar businesses.

However, neighbours to the proposed bar in Chesterton Road raised concerns about noise and the potential for people hanging around on the street drinking. Mr Taylor applied to Cambridge City Council for a licence to open the bar in the ground floor and basement of 54 Chesterton Road, the site of the former HSBC bank.

He asked for permission to sell alcohol between 11am and 11pm from Monday to Saturday, and between 11am and 10.30pm on Sunday. Permission was also requested to show plays, films, and play recorded music between 8am and 11pm on Monday to Saturday, and between 8am and 10.30pm on Sunday.

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The licence application also asked for permission for live music to be played between 12noon and 11pm from Monday to Saturday, and between 12noon and 10.30pm on Sunday. Mr Taylor said he had requested these hours to offer the business flexibility, but did not expect to always open to the full extent of the hours requested.

At a meeting of the city council’s licensing sub-committee this week (July 1) he told councillors he had been involved in businesses in Cambridge for around the last 10 years and highlighted that he had run a similar establishment at the Engineers House. He said: “The objective in terms of the venue is to create a community based hub, we do not want to create another Wetherspoons.

“We want to do tours in Cambridge based on well known Cambridge personnel, academics and townees. The idea for the tours is to run these tours and the end point for each tour will be our venue, where there will be a discussion about the tour after it is completed.”

Mr Taylor said they also wanted to offer other events such as birthday parties, film showings, and wellbeing classes. He added that he planned to apply for a pavement licence at a later date in order to have tables and chairs set up out the front of the bar for people to use. Mr Taylor addressed the noise concerns that had been raised by neighbours arguing they were “entirely unreasonable”. He suggested that people had formed the wrong opinion of what he was hoping to open and that he was “setting up some nightclub”, which he said was not the case.

He told councillors that he had hired an acoustic engineer to assess the noise levels in the building, and claimed it was not possible to hear any music being played in the basement from the outside. Mr Taylor said: “We do not want to upset our neighbours, we need to get the venue open and can then listen to what people say and respond. If there are any problems with noise emanating from the building I will ensure we deal with it.”

'There has been a massive expansion of places selling alcohol near our homes'

However, some of the neighbours who had raised concerns about the new cafe and bar said they were not satisfied with Mr Taylor’s explanation. Elizabeth Yarrow, who lives on the neighbouring Trafalgar Road, said she was very concerned about the plans to open the new bar so close to her family’s home.

She argued the licence applied for would allow the bar to potentially serve alcohol “all day everyday”. Ms Yarrow said she was also concerned about music being played into the night when she would be trying to get her children to sleep. She added that she thought the reassurances offered by Mr Taylor were “vague and full of assumptions”.

Alexis Mather, another nearby neighbour, said there had been a “massive expansion” of places selling alcohol along Chesterton Road in recent years. Ms Yarrow said she was concerned the new bar would “create additional harm” through adding to the cumulative impact of the number of bars and places that sell alcohol in the area.

Ben Rollings, who also lives nearby to the proposed bar, said most of the 21 objections to the licence came from people in the neighbouring roads The neighbours all said there was already a strong, close knit community in the area, highlighting that they had held a street party the day before the hearing.

However, they claimed the applicant had not properly consulted with them about the plans to open the new bar. Mr Mather asked for the application to be declined to enable them to “actually go through the steps of community engagement and discussion to come to a compromise” he said the neighbours could potentially support.

After considering the licence application and the objections to it in private, the sub-committee returned to the hearing and announced they would be granting the licence. However, they added an additional condition that no alcohol could be drunk outside, and restricted the hours alcohol could be sold at the bar to between 12noon and 7pm from Monday to Sunday.

Councillor Russ McPherson said the sub-committee had made this decision because the issues highlighted mostly happened at night, and that the applicant had not demonstrated that opening the bar into the evening would not add to the cumulative impact in the area.