As some of you may know, for the past several years, throughout several Officer teams, Anglia Ruskin Students’ Union have been campaigning for improved lighting on Parker’s Piece. This has included numerous meetings with local councillors, attending and speaking at town council meetings and lots of campaigning to students and people in the local area.

Opinions have been divided for a long time but through persistence and fantastic student involvement, I am very happy to announce that the recently proposed improved lighting on Parker’s Piece will be going ahead and are planned to be in effect in February.

This is a fantastic achievement and I want to thank everyone who got involved, sent their feedback to the council and campaigned to other students to make this happen. I especially want to thank the Cambridge Feminist Society for fully backing this project from the get go. After speaking to the committee about the project they got straight on board and really helped push this forward.

The lack of lighting on Parker's Piece has always been a point of concern for us, considering that it is used all through the night as much as it is used during the day. There is a high risk of crime for anyone walking across in the pitch black no matter who you are. We first started talking about the lack of lighting after the 2012 'Reclaim the Night' march in Cambridge, when our society first formed. When we heard that the council were asking for emails about the lighting installation we organised an awareness campaign at the center of Parker's Piece in order to help this project come to life.
-Anglia Ruskin Feminist Society

The improved lighting will vastly improve the safety for our students who regularly use Parker’s Piece as well as members of the public. Without all the amazing support for this project, the implementation of the lighting could have been put off, but thanks to the dedication of our students we will be seeing it come into effect very soon!

Thank you again to all involved, this is a fantastic win for all!

Gabbi Foreman

Academic Officer 2013/14