Barton Area Action Plan submitted

TonyOX3

The Barton Area Action Plan has been formally submitted to the Secretary of State. This link will take you to a page which lists all the documents but unless you have the perseverance of a saint or a town planner I don’t think you’ll find it easy to find what you’re looking for. For example, you might want to know what (if any) changes were made as a result of the latest consultation.

This document contains “Proposed Minor Post-Publication Changes” but these are only minor drafting changes for clarification, consistency etc. Part 2 of this one contains the ‘representations received’ on the most recent consultation exercise, but as far as I can work out no changes were made to the submission as a result – the February version of the Plan and the subsequent ‘representations’ go together to the Secretary of State.

The next step is the Examination in Public: the provisional date and venue for this is 16 to 20 July 2012 in Oxford Town Hall, but this may change.

Headington Headlines #59

TonyOX3

Here’s my weekly round-up of local news for 16 – 22 April —

The Headington Londis store run by Sunder Sandher is the first in the UK to roll out I-viewer, a shelf-mounted magnifying glass to help shoppers read the small print on labels. The I-viewer won ‘Best New Idea’ award at the National Convenience Show at the NEC. There’s a report here if you can be bothered to navigate to page 26 and there’s an I-viewer website built exclusively with Flash if you’ve got time to spare.

McKenna’s plans to use Woodeaton Quarry to dump waste clay and sand from building sites were approved on Monday. Lorries will use Bayswater Road, Barton and the B4027 to reach the quarry.

A £1,000 reward is offered for information about a burglary at a house in The Slade between noon and 4.30pm last Monday. A gold chain with a crucifix and rings, a Dunhill watch, two Mexican gold coins, a gold Seiko watch, three cameras and a bottle of brandy were stolen.

Café Noir reopened.

Andrew Smith MP asked a question in PM’s Questions on Wednesday about the potential closure of the @ACECentre and whether the government could make bridging finance available. Cameron says he knows the Centre and will work with Andrew Smith to look at what can be done.

@Oxford_Brookes students started an occupation protest against tuition fees.

A takeaway delivery driver was robbed in Brome Place, Barton on Tuesday.

Young riders from @HeadingtonSch did well in an inter-schools showjumping competition.

Armando Ianucci @AIanucci was among the people who abseiled down the JR’s Women’s Centre on Sunday.

My favorite Headington-related tweet this week:

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

  • St. George’s day in Headington
  • Barton Area Action Plan: see what was submitted to Secretary of State
  • 29 Old High Street (again)

There was also a thread about Councillor Ruth Wilkinson bit it’s title is too long to print here.

I try to 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.

Cotuit Hall development plans (2)

TonyOX3

I went along to the follow-up public consultation event at Cotuit Hall this afternoon. I live far enough away not to be significantly affected by the development but I was interested to see what changes EF and their architect/planners had made since the first open event in March (see my blog about it).

The main changes I found were that there was more detail about the environmental impact of the new buildings, the building design, and the management of construction traffic. In brief, the overall height of the new buildings has been lowered a little by making more use of the sloping site and even more landscaping to screen the buildings. The middle building will be clad in vertical wooden strips with similar features used to screen the external fire stairs; the lower building will be clad in wooden shingles which the architects say is to best blend in with the ‘rustic’ nature of that end of the site. The shingles will age to a natural silver-grey colour. Personally I’m not convinced that the vertical strip cladding wouldn’t be better throughout, but it’s a matter of taste.

Construction traffic will be managed on a ‘just in time’ basis. Deliveries will be held at a holding site away from Pullens Lane and called in only when the builders are ready to receive them. A banksman will control traffic in Pullens Lane (I think this probably means a stop-go man). I noted how bad the road surace is in Pullens Lane, especially the section between the main road and Cuckoo Lane. It’s bound to get worse with heavy lorries but I guess there’s a deal to be done between the residents (it’s a private road) and the school.

There was also information in the display about how the increased number of students would be managed – no student parking, student movement constrained to the central spine of the site and so on. I didn’t look closely at this aspect. To remind you, the school in Cotuit Hall is basically a boarding school for 16-18 year-olds.

The exhibition is open tomorrow (Saturday) between 09:00 and 12:00.