Hannah Gray meets two men who were instrumental in building the thousands of houses which brought new residents to Peterborough.

VERY few people were more involved in, or more able to give an overview of, the development of Peterborough, than Wyndham Thomas.

Wyndham was the general manager of Peterborough Development Corporation, which was set up to carry forward the expansion of Peterborough, in partnership with the city council and the county council.

Before he started work with the corporation in 1968, he was the director of the Town and County Planning Association, which had earlier urged that several more new towns were needed as counter-magnets to the pull of London.

As part of this statement, Wyndham advocated doubling the size of Peterborough under the New Towns Act.

This later became official policy, and when the development corporation was established in early 1968, he applied for the job as its general manager.

Why was Wyndham so keen for Peterborough in particular to be expanded?

"It was strategically located 80 miles from London and from Birmingham, on the mainline railway and next to the A1," he said.

"This made it attractive then, as it still does, to firms and other organisations looking to move out of London.

"It would also be attractive to families living in London's overcrowded inner districts, which could then be rebuilt to provide much better conditions for family life and business efficiency."

After getting the job, Wyndham, his wife Betty and their four children moved to the city from Hemel Hempstead.

An initial plan of how Peterborough could be developed had been prepared by the Government of the day, and the development corporation was urged to get on with the development using this plan.

Wyndham said: "I was never happy with it because its structure seemed artificial and rigid, while I preferred informal and different kinds of new neighbourhoods offering a wider choice of homes and local surroundings, and at lower densities."