Readers remain divided over the controversial Cambridge bus gate nearly a year after fines began, with strong views on traffic, businesses, and air quality

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Cambridgeshire Live readers remain divided over Mill Road’s bus gate, with passionate opinions about traffic, trade, and air quality. The bus gate continues to split opinion nearly 12 months after it became operational.

Cambridgeshire County Council implemented a permanent bus gate on Mill Road in 2025, with penalties initially handed out from March. The bus gate restricts all non-exempt vehicles from passing through, requiring them to take alternative routes.

Anyone who contravenes the bus gate receives a Penalty Charge Notice of £70, reduced to £35 if settled within 21 days. Exemptions allowing passage without incurring a fine include buses, taxis, cyclists, and emergency vehicles.

More than 4,600 penalties were issued during the first seven weeks after the bus gate’s activation, according to a Freedom of Information request submitted by the Local Democracy Service. Some residents argue that the restrictions have improved daily life.

One reader, Timbiscuit remarks: “‘Businesses’ [sic] will always want the bridge open due to the perceived more trade mindset. However, the shops are as busy as ever. I’ve lived on Mill Road for over twenty years. Traffic is less, air is cleaner, roads are safer, and more walking and cycling are taking place.”

Rhodabike adds: “‘The bus gate prevents all non-exempt vehicles passing through, meaning that they must use alternative routes.’ Exactly. Alternative routes are other neighbourhoods, which are now suffering increased congestion, thanks to the selfish demands of a vocal minority who can’t think beyond Mill Road.

“Visibly longer queues. And bus drivers are saying they’re struggling to run on time on other roads due to extra traffic. Plus, there’s the basic fact that cars, being physical objects, don’t disappear into thin air; every car no longer using Mill Road still exists somewhere else.”

Weneedqueenmeghan says: “The few businesses only want it open because it’s convenient for them to drive in and illegally dump their vehicles on the pavement. There are more people than ever shopping on Mill Road; it’s been proven over and over that pedestrianisation of areas increases footfall in shops.

“Remember, they tried to tell us traffic would go elsewhere, laugh! It hasn’t. They tried to tell us shops would lose business, it hasn’t! They tried to tell us drivers were stopping to shop, no, they weren’t, they were only using it as a rat run. Cyclists have been proven right once again.”

In contrast, Lilbec writes: “I don’t know anyone who actually agrees with closing the bridge. And bits [sic] clearly affecting businesses, whether you like it or not. If you don’t like living in an area with traffic, why did you choose to live there in the first place? If there is less traffic now, it’s only because people are abandoning Cambridge as a decent place to visit.”

Arborealfriend says: “I’ve lived off Mill Road for over a quarter century. The bridge restrictions are a huge improvement. I’ve spoken to traders who find the restriction inconvenient for a cash’n’carry run, whilst others – especially café/restaurant owners – appreciate the cleaner air and the way that there is now more passing trade. On foot. Stopping. Shopping. Eating. Drinking. Not driving past polluting. To check the FACTS about traffic, SmartCambridge (DotOrg) have sensors and full data available. No, there ain’t loadsa extra motor traffic on surrounding roads.”

Do you think the scheme is really making Mill Road safer, or is it just shifting the congestion elsewhere? Have your say in our comments section.

A new species of dinosaur known as the ‘hell-heron’ has some fantasy fans believing that Game of Thrones-style dragons could have once terrorised our planet.

A mysterious ‘dragon-like’ skull uncovered by scientists in the Sahara has people wondering if it was a fire-breathing beast or, thanks to its horn, some kind of Jurassic unicorn.

While ‘officially’ flying reptiles grabbing villagers and torching castles have never existed, it is thought that these legends evolved from people spotting large reptiles in the wild.

The bones were discovered by University of Chicago palaeontologist Paul Sereno and his team.

‘I definitely think the ancients encountered at least a couple of things like this because this is definitely a dragon,’ one person claimed on social media.

Landing in North Africa, Serano ended up meeting a local Tuareg man who led them on his motorbike deep into the centre of the Sahara, where he had seen huge fossil bones.

With night closing in and time running out before having to return, the team found a set of teeth and jaw bones from this new species of Spinosaurus.

Publishing their work in the journal Science, scientists estimated there were ten to 17 different species of this prehistoric predator.

The team say the finding of Spinosaurus mirabilis, is the first new spinosaurid species discovered in more than a century. 

‘This find was so sudden and amazing, it was really emotional for our team,’ said Sereno in a statement.

Reconstructions of the skull have revealed more than a passing similarity with the mythical fire-breathing creatures.

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‘I’ll forever cherish the moment in camp when we crowded around a laptop to look at the new species for the first time’, he added.

Spinosaurid teeth found not far from the shoreline had led some experts to hypothesise that these fish-eaters may have been fully aquatic, but the most recent discovery miles inland makes scientists believe it was more of a wader.

‘I envision this dinosaur as a kind of ‘hell heron’ that had no problem wading on its sturdy legs into two meters of water but probably spent most of its time stalking shallower traps for the many large fish of the day,’ Sereno said.

At the end of the Cenomanian period, about 95 million years ago, an abruptrise in sea level and climate change brought the spinosaurid era to an untimely end.

But despite its tragic demise, the replicas will join the Dinosaur Expedition exhibit at the Chicago Children’s Museum next month.

‘Letting kids feel the excitement of new discoveries—that’s key to ensuring the next generation of scientists who will discover many more things about our precious planet worth preserving,’ Sereno said.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

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President Donald Trump will deliver the first State of the Union address of his second term on Tuesday. Priorities for the Republican’s administration have centered largely on the economy, immigration, crime, energy and national security.

Trump has spent the last year touting his accomplishments while mocking the record of his predecessor, former President Joe Biden. But much of this bluster is based on false and misleading claims — many of which are likely to be a part of the president’s address to the nation.

Here’s a look at some of the false and misleading statements Trump has made at recent public appearances.

Economy

Trump often says the U.S. is now “the hottest country anywhere in the world” after years as a “dead country.” The U.S. economy was hardly “dead’’ when Trump returned to office last year. But in his second term, it’s generally performed strongly — after getting off to a bumpy start.

In 2024, the last year of Biden’s presidency, U.S. gross domestic product grew 2.8%, adjusted for inflation, faster than any wealthy country in the world except Spain. It also expanded at a healthy rate from 2021 through 2023.

GDP shrank for the first time in three years during the first quarter of 2025. Growth rebounded in the second half of the year, but slowed again in the fourth quarter. Annual GDP growth in 2025 was 2.2%.

A key measure of inflation fell to nearly a five-year low in January. However, according to the Federal Reserve’s preferred measure, it remains elevated as the cost of goods such as furniture, clothes and groceries increase.

Companies have also sharply reduced hiring. Employers added just 181,000 jobs in 2025, the fewest — outside a recession — since 2002. Economists blame a range of factors: Uncertainty created by tariffs and artificial intelligence likely caused many firms to hold back on adding workers. And many companies hired like gangbusters in the aftermath of the pandemic and have since decided to forgo creating any new positions.

The U.S. stock market did well last year and yet it underperformed many foreign stock markets. The benchmark S&P 500 index climbed 17% — a nice gain but short of a 71% surge in South Korea, 29% in Hong Kong, 26% in Japan, 22% in Germany and 21% in the United Kingdom.

Investments

Trump has repeatedly claimed that the U.S. has secured up to $18 trillion in investments, but has presented no evidence of such a high number. The figure appears to be exaggerated, highly speculative or both.

The White House website offers a far lower number, $9.6 trillion, and that figure appears to include some investment commitments made during the Biden administration.

A study published in January raised doubts about whether more than $5 trillion in investment commitments made last year by many of America’s biggest trading partners will actually materialize and questions how it would be spent if it did.

Immigration

A key aspect of the Trump administration’s agenda is curbing illegal immigration, though the president often uses falsehoods to support his arguments.

For example, Trump has repeatedly claimed that an influx of immigrants has led to a massive increase in crime. While FBI statistics do not separate out crimes by the immigration status of the assailant, there is no evidence of a spike in crime perpetrated by migrants, either along the U.S.-Mexico border or in cities seeing the greatest influx of migrants, like New York. Studies have found that people living in the U.S. illegally are less likely than native-born Americans to have been arrested for violent, drug and property crimes.

The president also frequently references upward of 300,000 migrant children who are allegedly missing. This misrepresents information in an August 2024 report published by the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of the Inspector General, which faulted Immigration and Customs Enforcement for failing to consistently “monitor the location and status of unaccompanied migrant children” once they are released from federal government custody.

Energy

Trump consistently lauds coal as the ideal energy source, calling it “beautiful, clean coal.” The production of coal is cleaner now than it has been historically, but that doesn’t mean it’s clean.

Planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions from the coal industry have decreased over the past 30 years, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. And yet United Nations-backed research has found that coal production worldwide still needs to be reduced sharply to address climate change.

Along with carbon dioxide, burning coal emits sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides that contribute to acid rain, smog and respiratory illnesses, according to the EIA.

The president also regularly denigrates wind power, claiming that it is expensive and that windmills kill birds.

Onshore wind is one of the cheapest sources of electricity generation, with new wind farms expected to produce energy costing around $30 per megawatt hour, according to July estimates from the Energy Information Administration.

Wind turbines, like all infrastructure, can pose a risk to birds. However, the National Audubon Society, which is dedicated to the conservation of birds, thinks developers can manage these risks and climate change is a greater threat.

Elections

In the lead-up to the 2026 midterms, Trump has taken to repeating the claim that he won the 2020 presidential election.

This is a blatant falsehood that has been disproven many times over — the 2020 election was not stolen.

Biden’s win has been affirmed through recounts, audits and reviews in the battleground states where Trump disputed his 2020 loss. He and his allies lost dozens of court challenges related to the election, and his own attorney general at the time said there was no widespread fraud that would have altered the results.

Biden earned 306 electoral votes to Trump’s 232. He also won over 7 million more popular votes than Trump.

Additionally, the president brags that his 2024 win was a “landslide.” But Trump’s margin of victory was not as large as he makes it seem.

He won the electoral vote 312 to 226, including all seven swing states, according to the Federal Election Commission. The popular vote, however, was far closer, with Trump receiving 49.8% of the vote with 77,302,580 votes cast to Democrat Kamala Harris’ 75,017,613 votes (48.32%).

Crime

Trump takes credit for a significant decrease in violent crime during 2025, claiming the murder rate in the U.S. dropped to its lowest in 125 years. But this is misleading. Crime had already been trending down in recent years.

A study released in January by the Independent Council on Criminal Justice, which collected data from 35 U.S. cities on homicides, showed a 21% decrease in the homicide rate from 2024 to 2025.

The report noted that when nationwide data for jurisdictions of all sizes is reported by the FBI later this year, there is a strong possibility that homicides in 2025 will drop to about 4.0 per 100,000 residents. That would be the lowest rate ever recorded in law enforcement or public health data going back to 1900.

FBI reports for 2023 and 2024 show significant reductions in violent crimes.

Crime surged during the coronavirus pandemic, with homicides increasing nearly 30% in 2020 over the previous year, the largest one-year jump since the FBI began keeping records. But violent crime dropped to near pre-pandemic levels around 2022 when Biden was president.

The increase in violent crime during the pandemic defied easy explanation, and experts similarly said the historic drop in violence last year defies easy explanation despite elected officials at all levels — both Democrats and Republicans — rushing to claim credit.

Foreign policy

One of Trump’s most frequent talking points is he has “solved” eight wars, a statistic that is highly exaggerated. Although he has helped mediate relations among many nations, his impact isn’t as clear-cut as he makes it seem.

The conflicts Trump counts among those that he has solved are between Israel and Hamas, Israel and Iran, Egypt and Ethiopia, India and Pakistan, Serbia and Kosovo, Rwanda and Congo, Armenia and Azerbaijan, and Cambodia and Thailand.

___

Associated Press writers Claudia Lauer in Philadelphia and Josh Boak and Christopher Rugaber in Washington contributed to this report.

___

Find AP Fact Checks here: https://apnews.com/APFactCheck.

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Police are searching for two burglars who have absconded from HMP Hollesley Bay in Suffolk.

James Dooley, aged 23, was reported missing to police in the early hours of this morning.

Dooley is serving a sentence of six years and three months for a number of burglary offences and intent to pervert the course of justice.

He is described as white, 6ft 1in tall and with brown hair.

He has links to the Wood Green area of north London, the Waltham Cross area of Hertfordshire and the Slough area of Berkshire.

Andrew Cash, 32, was also reported missing to police.

Cash is serving a sentence of six-and-a-half years for burglary offences.

He is described as white, 6ft 1in tall, of medium build and with brown hair.

He has links to the areas of Newmarket and Bury St Edmunds and also Southampton.

This is a breaking news story… More to follow…

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First stop: Grand Resort, Bad Ragaz (double rooms from £756, resortragaz.ch), which is renowned for its detoxifying thermal water supply, or ‘liquid gold’ as the hotel staff call it. It runs through the pretty Heidi town which gives the hotel its name, and a spring on-site supplies the hotel’s ornate Helenabad baths, and pools in the Tamina Therme. The 233-bedroom stay, which sprawls over 200 acres, is also a renowned medi-spa, with its recently opened Tamina Health Centre attracting many wealthy guests who come to recoup after surgery, or to take one of its advanced programmes, for everything from longevity to weight loss. Seeing many of your fellow guests navigating the hotel’s corridors in crutches took some getting used to – though after an afternoon spent administering myself some contrast therapy in the spas, dipping in and out of its six saunas, baths and ice grotto, my shoulders were firmly lowered, and I was blissfully in my own world when I floated back to room to read and order sushi.

Dame Prue Leith, the 86-year-old television cook, has revealed her surprising experience with the weight loss injection Mounjaro, stating she “did not lose a single pound” despite trying the medication for a month. The culinary icon admitted the jab “didn’t do anything” for her, contrasting sharply with her husband’s significant success.

Despite her personal outcome, Dame Prue expressed her belief that the treatment is “worth a go”, having been inspired by her retired fashion designer husband, John Playfair. He reportedly lost “three stone and is healthier than anything” after using Mounjaro, prompting her to think, ‘oh, well, maybe I’ll have a go’.

However, the broadcaster confessed her lack of adherence to instructions was the likely culprit. She admitted to the Press Association: “I tried, but it didn’t do anything. I didn’t read the instructions.” Dame Prue explained she inadvertently consumed only around 200 calories daily, leading her body into “starvation mode”.

She elaborated: “I reckon I was eating 200 calories a day, which I didn’t realise. And what your body then does is it simply says, ‘this is starvation. I mustn’t let anything go’. I did not lose a single pound. So I lost no weight, although for two weeks I was eating almost nothing.”

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Reflecting on the experience, she concluded: “I don’t think I need to (use it). It’s bloody expensive, and I think if it’s not going to work, it’s a waste of money.”

The revelation comes as Dame Prue also discusses her dietary habits in her latest book, Being Old…And Learning To Love It! She shared that during her tenure on Channel 4’s Great British Bake Off, she never gained weight, attributing it to a diet of cake and red wine.

She told PA: “Cake and wine go together. I mean, it’s obviously not a diet to be recommended. It worked fine for me. It’s only 10 weeks of my life, and it’s only two days of every week. It’s not seven days a week. For 20 days, I lived on cake and wine.”

Last month, Dame Prue announced her decision to step down as a judge from the popular baking competition after nine years. Her primary reason for leaving was the show’s summer filming schedule, which she wishes to dedicate to holidays in Europe. She expressed: “I could have happily gone on doing it forever. I know I would miss it, but I’m running out of time.”

Cookbook author Nigella Lawson was recently confirmed as her replacement, a choice Dame Prue wholeheartedly endorsed. She commented: “(Nigella) is going to be absolutely brilliant. She’ll be very different, but she’s a class act. She really knows what she’s doing.”

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Beyond Bake Off, Dame Prue’s illustrious six-decade career includes judging Great British Menu and extensive involvement in food education, earning her a damehood in 2021 for her services to food, broadcasting, and charity.

Merthyr Tydfil Council’s budget was voted through by councillors on Monday, February 23

A 4.95% council tax increase has been approved for Merthyr Tydfil residents next year. The council’s £183.69m budget proposals for 2026/2027 were approved by cabinet and full council on Monday, February 23.

On council tax, the budget report said the initial provisional local government settlement would have meant an even higher level of council tax was needed for next year, but in light of the final settlement, a 4.95% was proposed, which will “avoid excessive increases in council tax and maintain as many services as possible.”

This will result in a band D council tax of £2,186.33 for 2026/27, equating to an additional £103.12 for the year, or £1.98 per week.

The weekly increase ranges from £1.32 at the lowest band A to £4.63 at the highest band I. Ensure our latest news and sport headlines always appear at the top of your Google Search by making us a Preferred Source. Click here to activate or add us as Preferred Source in your Google search settings

This results in a net reduction in council tax levy income of £21,000.

The report said that as 84% of the properties within the county borough were valued at bands A to C, a significant proportion of council taxpayers would be liable to payments less than £2,186.33, and it also mentions the council tax reduction scheme.

In terms of cuts, the budget plan includes proposals to remove £3.58m from the revenue budget next year, made up of £1.69m permanent savings, £34,000 in the use of one-off service earmarked reserves, and £1.85m of temporary savings which are not sustainable in the medium or long term.

No additional efficiencies were being asked of schools across Merthyr Tydfil, the report said.

But it added: “Schools across Merthyr Tydfil continue to face significant financial pressure through pay, pension and other costs.

“Due to the ongoing financial challenges faced by local government, the draft budget proposal does not provide the funding required to fully support the schools funding formula.”

The report highlighted the financial pressure schools faced, particularly in relation to the increased number and complexity of additional learning needs.

“Governing bodies, like other council services, will need to consider how they manage these resources and deliver a budget that complies with the scheme for the financing of schools.”

The report also mentioned pay pressures (£534,000) and £2.6m in unavoidable additional demands resulting from service financial pressures such as demographic growth, legislative changes, new initiatives, loss of income and changes to grants terms and conditions.

The final local government settlement from Welsh Government resulted in a funding increase of 4.7% for Merthyr Tydfil, which reduced the budget gap by £7.74m

After taking into account factors including adjustments to the council tax base (£146,000), employee costs reductions (£2.35m), capital financing costs (£1.35m), an accountancy review of assumptions (£1.18m) and the 2025/2026 transformation programme (£354,000), the council is left with a budget gap of £509,000. Stay informed on everything Merthyr Tydfil by signing up to our newsletter here

This will be closed through a variety of means including a 3.4% rise in charges for paid-for council services and the council tax increase.

Councillor Lisa Mytton, Independent, said it was a very difficult decision trying to balance the books and agree on council tax as well.

She said they’d been promised reform of council tax for nearly six years and that was so desperately needed because it was “not fair and it’s not equal.”

Cllr Mytton said the First Minister and Plaid Cymru agreed to a budget designed to protect the most vulnerable and said “we in Merthyr Tydfil aren’t doing that.”

She said other authorities were doing that and that the council tax increase proposed, when they could mitigate it in other areas, was “not necessary” and they could bring it down by at least 1%. She said it went “against the grain and spirit of the national budget and the needs of our community.”

Councillor Geraint Thomas, leader of the Independent group, said: “We did have an opportunity over the last week or so to reduce council tax by 1% and 3.95 was getting closer to the inflation rate which I think was palatable.”