Haboakus

Headington Headlines #200

TonyOX3

Another milestone reached – the 200th edition of Headington Headlines! There’s nothing particularly exciting to mark the occasion, but here anyway is my 200th weekly round-up of local news. It covers the week 2 – 8 February.

The persistent rumour that the Post Office might move into the Co-op was given some weight when local Councillor @RuthWilk confirmed that the Co-op “had expressed strong interest” in the idea.

As I reported in HH197, work on the Dora Carr Close development in Northway is starting. Architecture students at @Oxford_Brookes are designing and making a hoarding for the site “where people can share their view about the new development”. I think they mean ‘view’ as in ‘opinion’: it will be interesting to see how this plays out, and whether the local graffiti artists will allow others to join in. You can follow the students on twitter at @NewNorthway.

As mentioned last week, Johnsons Cleaners closed on Thursday. They have moved to Summertown.

Construction has started at the JR of a new ‘Welcome Centre’ which will include an M&S Simply Food shop and an M&S café. However, the site works mean that all the disabled parking spaces right next to the main hospital entrance have been lost. Although the disabled spaces in the nearby car park are rarely all taken, it does mean that disabled access will now be more difficult for some.

The Quarry Hollow street sign by the Chequers was hit by a car and broken on Saturday. Councillor @RosalindRogers is looking concerned and is on the case. She has the car’s registration, so if it was you I’d come clean now!

Active posts on the Headington & Marston e-democracy forum this week:

  • Funding for eDemocracy.org
  • Pub on Barton Park?
  • Review of Housing Policy
  • Loss of trees in Headington Quarry
  • Does anyone know
I cover news from the OX3 postcode in Headington and out as far as Barton, Sandhills and Risinghurst (see map). To feed into next week’s summary you can comment on this article, or tweet either with the hashtag #ox3 or @mentioning @TonyOX3.

Headington Headlines #197

TonyOX3

Here’s my weekly round-up of local news for 12 – 18 January.

Temple Bookbinders of Stephen Road have been awarded a Royal Warrant. This means they can now describe themselves as “By appointment to HM The Queen”. The Oxford Mail report cites Bentley cars as another warrant holder, which is fine, but I’m not so sure about the comparison with baked beans (Heinz) and Creme Eggs (Cadbury).

@HeadingtonA, who organise the Farmers’ Market, say they are working on bringing more stall-holders in after the number of traders dropped earlier this month.

Fire crews attended a ‘small engine fire‘ on an @OxfordBusCo bus in Wood Farm on Tuesday. No passengers were affected.

Headington Hill Park car park (the one at the bottom of the Park) will be closed from today (19 Jan) while a new access road to the properties inside the Park is built.

A man was sentenced to three years imprisonment for two burglaries last October, one in Northway and one in Tilehouse Close.

In a well-signalled move, @Oxford_Brookes announced their long-term plan to move all teaching, research and supporting activity from Wheatley over the next ten years. This will obviously have a major effect on the Headington Campus and Headington generally, and the university has promised thorough consultation. Their official announcement has much more detail and is worth reading. I will write more on this story as it unfolds.

It was almost exactly two years ago I first reported that developers Haboakus had submitted two planning applications for sites in Northway (see this map). The ‘Hab’ part of their name is celebrity architect Kevin McCloud’s company, although in what way if any he may be personally involved is not clear. Now at last work has started on the Dora Carr Close site which will provide 47 new homes: 15 three-bedroom houses, 4 four-bedroom houses and 28 one and two bedroom flats, and a state-of-the-art community centre. The buildings have been designed by architects Allford Hall Monaghan Morris of Camberwell, London. A search on this blog for Haboakus will give you the past hisory of this development.

In Headington Headlines 195 I reported that the Bury Knowle Club was on the market for £300k. Now Oxford-based Keble Homes has submitted a planning application (Ref 15/00062/FUL) to convert the Club, which is on the first floor of the shops on the west side of Windmill Road, into flats.

Starting today (Monday) diversions will be in place as work on the St Clements/Plain junction begins. City-bound traffic will be diverted down Dawson Street onto the Cowley Road to reach The Plain. Headington-bound traffic will use the Cowley Road, then Jeune Street to get back onto St Clements. Details and maps here.

Bill Simpson, of BBB Stores on London Road next to the Post Office, had a sarcastic letter published in the Oxford Mail under the title "Reasons to come to Headington".

My favourite Headington-related tweet of the week:

Wikipedia knows about ‘manicule‘ but oxforddictionaries doesn’t.

Active posts on the Headington & Marston e-democracy forum this week:

  • Brookes moving teaching facilities from Wheatley to Headington
  • New Headington bus routes
  • Bury Knowle Club in Windmill Road
  • Brookes Estates Strategy
  • The Economist on Oxford/Cambridge
I cover news from the OX3 postcode in Headington and out as far as Barton, Sandhills and Risinghurst (see map). To feed into next week’s summary you can comment on this article, or tweet either with the hashtag #ox3 or @mentioning @TonyOX3.

Headington Headlines #158

TonyOX3

Here’s my weekly round-up of local news for 7 – 13 April.

The main obstacles to the Haboakus developments in Northway seem to have been removed with Thames Water agreeing what needs to be done about the sewerage system.

Dr Mark Crowley, a Consultant Anaesthetist from the JR Hospital, has been selected to play for the England over-40s Masters hockey team. England currently hold the World, European and Home Nations championships at this level.

Following the news of the retirement of Headteacher Keith Ponsford last week, it’s been announced that Bayards Hill primary school in Barton is to become an academy school from the start of the new term. It will be sponsored by Cheney School, the secondary school to which many Bayards Hill pupils progress.

New fitness equipment was installed in Headington Hill Park, some of it in the wrong place according to the newly-formed Friends. The Council has said it will move the offending apparatus.

The planning application for a change of use from retail to a restaurant/café at the ex-Trade Exchange shop on the London Road was withdrawn. It was unlikely to have been successful anyway.

Active topics on the Headington & Marston e-democracy forum this week:

  • London road from Hamburger roundabout to Headington
  • Bar Meze
  • Proposed Changes to Green Road Roundabout
  • Tree-felling on Oxford Bypass adjacent to Northway
  • Tree Felling on A40 By Pass
  • Barton / Northway bus link
  • Northway consultation
I cover news from the OX3 postcode in Headington and out as far as Barton, Sandhills and Risinghurst (see map). To feed into next week’s summary you can comment on this article, or tweet either with the hashtag #ox3 or @mentioning @TonyOX3.