Jockey Club’s housing plan for Pinewood Stud in Newmarket goes on show today at town exhibition

A second exhibition organised by the Jockey Club to update Newmarket residents on progress since it first unveiled its plans for housing, a country park, an all-weather racetrack, and training starter yards on the town’s Racecourse Side opens today.

The first Playing Our Part in Newmarket’s Future exhibition was in 2022 and outlined a range of ideas for discussion on how The Jockey Club could best play its part in ensuring a healthy, vibrant and prosperous future for the town that it has called home for the past 300 years.

Feedback from the first consultation showed that 76 per cent of people who responded supported the proposals.

On display at the new exhibition, which is on today between 10am and 7pm and tomorrow between 10am and 4pm in the White Hart’s function room in the High Street, will be six concepts for the layout of around 415 homes at Pinewood Stud alongside a 75-acre Seven Springs Country Park.

Both the park and the new homes allocation feature in West Suffolk Council’s draft local plan which, when adopted, will provide a blueprint for future development right across the district over the next 15-20 years.

Although an all-weather racetrack, mentioned at the first exhibition, does not feature in the plan, the town’s horseracing policies would provide the opportunity for developing such a facility in Newmarket, should it be needed in the future.

Also on display at the first exhibition was the concept of a cinema in the former Subscription Rooms in the High Street. Earlier this year the Newmarket Charitable Foundation (NCF) opened the new Kings Cinema in the old Kings Theatre the first in the town for almost 50 years.

Josh Schunmann, executive director of the NCF, said: “Whilst the charity has been responsible for delivering the cinema, the response to the consultation in March 2022 was certainly the catalyst behind it.”

The NCF will have its own display at Playing our Part in Newmarket’s Future, reporting on the progress that has been made since the charity was formed in 2021, explaining what it hopes to achieve next and calling for volunteers.

All the information on show, including the concept designs for Pinewood and Seven Springs Country Park, will be available on www.letsplayourpart.co.uk from today with an opportunity to leave feedback online.