A new All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) has been created to help lobby government on the needs for the East West corridor from Oxford to Cambridge. The group sees housing and transport bodies joining forces, including representation from Highways England, East West Railway Company and England’s Economic Heartland (EEH), to focus on the needs of the ARC Corridor.

We’ll be hearing from hosting the Oxford Cambridge Corridor Economic Growth Conference in association with Bouygues Energies & Services on June 21st in Milton Keynes – which is supported by The National Infrastructure Commission and England’s Economic Heartland along with local authorities and enterprise groups.

At the launch of the group APPG chair Iain Stewart said that the greatest challenge facing the group was that the stakeholders had not traditionally worked together, so it would now have to think innovatively about how the different parties were brought together. He said: ”This corridor covers three separate regions, East Midlands, East of England and Oxfordshire. It’s a big challenge finding a way of harnessing everyone together and we will have to think of a new delivery and governance mechanism to make it happen. There isn’t an ideal solution out there so we will have to innovate and do something new. Without it, there is a real danger that a series of individual projects just wont fit well together – so it needs that strategic overview.”

The group will now work to lobby government on the corridor’s strategic needs and getting cross government department consensus on issues going forward.

The Oxford – Milton Keynes – Cambridge corridor represents an incredible opportunity for regional economic growth – with improved connectivity, communication, infrastructure, housing and more. The National Infrastructure Commission believes the area could support a further 700,000 jobs by 2050.

We’re excited to hear more from key stakeholders at the Oxford Cambridge Corridor Economic Growth Conference in association with Bouygues Energies & Services so join us there.