Overview
Milton is a village just north of Cambridge on the other side of the A14. It has a population of approximately 4,300 with 3,200 being on the Register of Electors. It expanded considerably in the late 80’s when two large estates were built between the bypass and the village resulting in a doubling of the population between the 1986 and 1991 census. (In the next decade its population remained static and according to the 2001 census it was still around 4,300.)
In Cambridge Milton is perhaps best known for its Tesco store (see below). However Milton is more than just a series of housing estates with a supermarket tacked on: the old parts of the village have a great deal of charm and it retains its village character despite being so close to Cambridge.
17th Century Cottage in Milton (2 Church Lane)
There are two areas of the civil parish of Milton which these pages largely ignore. The Cambridge Science Park is technically part of Milton, being just outside the city limits. The other area is the area known as Milton Detached or Chesterton Fen, being the section of Fen Road, Chesterton north of the railway line. However both of these areas are much more part of Cambridge than Milton, being to the south of the A14.
One of the oddities of Milton is that the main road through the village changes names three times. From Tesco to the New Apostolic church it is called Cambridge Road, from there to Pond Green it’s High Street, and for the last stretch out of the village it’s Ely Road (while High Street turns left past the Waggon and Horses until it changes name to Landbeach Road!). The reason for these name changes is described on our history page. To avoid confusion, on this page we describe this road throughout its length as the “high street”, without capitals.
Community
Milton is in the county of Cambridgeshire, so services such as education and transport come from Cambridgeshire County Council.
Milton falls within South Cambridgeshire District Council (SCDC), a district covering the whole area around the city of Cambridge, but not the city itself. Their offices are at Cambourne.
You can find contact details for your district councillors here under “Milton”.
In planning matters SCDC consults Milton Parish Council, who meet regularly in the Bowls Pavilion or their office, both on Coles Road. Their minutes are posted on the noticeboard behind the war memorial on the corner of Coles Road and Fen Road and and are also available online. The parish council does its best to ensure that Milton continues to be a pleasant place to live, not least by planting masses of daffodils all over the village, which brighten the village in the early spring.
You can find contact details for your parish councillors here.
For older or disabled villagers the parish council runs a Mobile Warden scheme to help villagers to live independent lives in their own homes and Barnabas Court provides sheltered housing in the heart of the village.
We have a doctors’ surgery in the village and a vet, but no dentist (there is a shortage of NHS dentists but there is a helpline number which will give you the details of those in Cambridge which are accepting NHS patients on 01553 811513).
A group of enthusiastic villagers distribute a free newsletter called Milton Village View five times a year. It’s an excellent publication, with details of village events and adverts for local traders.
Childrens’ Hospice in the old Rectory
The children’s hospice, in the old rectory and its grounds, provides a valuable service for life limited children from all over the region.
Cambridgeshire Mencap run the Edmund House group of homes, located in and around Edmund Close in the heart of the village, providing community living for people with a learning disability.
Refuse and Recycling
All the details are available on our Refuse Collection page.
Shops
Milton is dominated by a Tesco supermarket at the southern edge of the village. Their site also includes a coffee shop, cash dispensers, limited re-cycling facilities, the only petrol station in the village and a dry cleaners.
Milton Tesco
Other than that there are two small parades of shops. One on the high street includes a One Stop general store which is open all hours and also provides a newspaper delivery service, an Indian takeaway, a barber shop, a florist, a bakery which also offers sandwiches, hot pies etc, and the Harmony hair and beauty salon.
The other parade is on Coles Road. There you will find the village Post Office which also sells newspapers and stationery, and takes in dry cleaning. Next door is the Archie Rogers hair and nail salon. Across the road you’ll find Katana, a mens hairdresser’s, and Shiralee, a clothing and fabric alteration shop.
There are also a number of isolated shops around the village. Stephanie’s Unisex Hairdressing professional hairstyling for men and women in the high street (tel 420526). The Parlour hair studio can be found on The Rowans, as can Milton Antiques and Collectables. Godden Auto Services at Benet Garage both sells and services cars and does MoT tests and beside it you will find the Unicorn House Chinese takeaway and Jaws fish and chip shop.
Sunclose Farm on Butt Lane beyond the bypass offers soft fruit from May to August.
Further afield, if you want vegetarian wholefood or organic produce beyond the limited selection offered by Tesco, the Daily Bread co-operative in Kings Hedges offers a wide range of produce.
Other supermarkets in the area include Iceland and Aldi in north Cambridge, Sainsbury in east Cambridge (and the city centre) and Tesco stores in on Newmarket Road in Cambridge and at Fulbourn and Bar Hill (the latter being vast with a big non-foods section). Waitrose fans will find their favourite store in Trumpington, south of Cambridge. Several of the supermarkets now offer home delivery.
Cambridge city centre offers the best choice of shopping in the area, with buses from Milton every half hour during the day.
Restaurants and Takeaways
There is no dedicated restaurant in Milton, but all the pubs (see below) do food at lunchtime and evenings (although do check as some don’t do food every evening).
For takeaway food you can get Indian from the shop on the parade in the high street, Chinese or fish and chips from shops behind Benet Garage, and a kebab or burger from the kebab van which is parked most nights opposite Tesco. The Milton Spice Indian takeaway offers home delivery.
We have two coffee shops in the village, all in other establishments:
- Grounds Café inside the Visitor Centre of Milton Country Park
- Costa Coffee inside Tesco. A number of other takeaways in Histon and Cambridge offer home delivery to Milton – you’ll find details in the flyers you get with the local free papers.
Pubs
There are three other pubs in the village, all within a few hundred yards on each other.
The
Jolly Brewers just off the high street on Fen Road serves food lunchtime and evening and offers accommodation.
The
Lion & Lamb on the high street serves food lunchtime and evening.
The
White Horse is also on the high street and has a large garden. It has a variety of guest beers and serves food every lunchtime and evening.
Accommodation
Ambassador Lodge
The only accommodation in the village is Ambassador Lodge opposite Pond Green or The Brewers Inn (see above) but Cambridge has a wide variety of hotels and guest houses.
Education
We have our own primary school in the village which gets good Ofsted reports. At eleven most pupils go to either Impington Village College or St. Bede’s, Cambridge We also have an Agricultural College in the village which is part of the College of West Anglia.
Religion
We have two churches in the village. The Church of England church of All Saints’ in Church Lane. It dates from the 12th century, with many later additions.
All Saints Church
The New Apostolic Church is in the high street close to the shops. For Baptists, the Landbeach Baptist church is a short distance away on the other side of the A10. Contact details and times of services for all of these churches can be found in the village directory.
New Apostolic Church
Leisure
There are a very wide variety of clubs and societies in the village which meet throughout the week at a variety of venues including Milton Community Centre on Coles Road and the recreations grounds on Coles Road and the Sycamores. There are a wide range of sports available including football, cricket, netball, tennis and both indoor and outdoor bowls. For youngsters we have
beavers, cubs, scouts, brownies and guides as well as a number of youth groups catering for different ages and interests.
Milton Community Centre – Coles Road
You’ll find contact details for all these activities in the Village Directory.
Milton Country Park to the east of the village offers pleasant walks beside several lakes of varying sizes and has a full programme of activities.
The River Cam is well worth a visit. You can walk down Fen Road through the conservation area, across the level crossing to the river and then watch the boats working through the lock at Baits Bite and, just beyond that, students and local preparing to row their “eights” towards town.
Lent Bumps on the Cam
For a pleasant, if somewhat noisy walk, you might also care to try the path on top of the bund separating the village from the A10 bypass. Surrounded for much of the length by bushes and trees it’s only the sound of the cars on the A10 that tells you you’re not in the middle of a dense wood.
Although there is no adult swimming pool in the village there is a pool in Impington just west of Milton and another at Bottisham to the east. There are also two indoor pools, Parkside and Abbey, in the city along with an outdoor pool on Jesus Green which opens each summer.
For everything else being close to Cambridge means we have various night clubs, several of gigging venues, three multi-screen cinemas, a number of theatres, plus a wealth of professional and amateur performances of all kinds in the university colleges all close at hand.
