Bayswater Farm housing development

TonyOX3

News broke yesterday that South Oxfordshire District Council (SODC) is considering land at Bayswater Farm on the edge of Barton for housing development. The story seems to originate here, a news release from SODC in mid-June. It explains that their plans to meet new housing requirements partially from ‘windfall’ sites were thrown out by a planning inspector so they have had to look again at where 800 new homes that they had allocated to unspecified windfall sites could go. Under the broad heading ‘larger villages’ the phrase ‘land at Bayswater Farm’ is included. The changed strategy went before a full Council meeting on 30 June – the minutes don’t seem to be online yet, but I believe the Council did approve the revised strategy.

Local people are very aware of Oxford City’s proposed expansion of Barton, but probably not many realised that SODC’s boundary came so close. The maps confirm that the City/SODC boundary runs along the backs of the gardens on the edge of Barton and Sandhills.

What is not clear is whether SODC owns any of the land around Bayswater Farm, nor is there any indication of how many houses they might hope to build there. To put it in perspective, Oxford City’s Barton West development is said to be of the order of 1000 homes. There does not seem to be a map among the documents that went to the Council meeting.

Whatever the merits or otherwise of SODC’s proposals, it is obvious that any development adjoining existing or new housing in Barton should be integrated with the City’s plans.

Headington Headlines #19

TonyOX3

Here is my weekly round-up of news for the week 27 June – 3 July.

BT may have introduced their Infinity fibre optic system in Headington exchange this week. Or they may not.

@OxfordCity used an interim management order for the first time in Oxfordshire to take control of an HMO (house in multiple occupancy). The house in Salford Road, Marston is an unlicensed HMO that contains six people. The landlord is not considered a fit and proper person to hold a licence after being prosecuted twice before for offences at HMOs in Craufurd Road and Marston Road.

Two men appeared at Oxford Magistrates’ Court on Friday charged with rape and other offences after an alleged assault in Barton.

@TheOxfordMail reported that the Sikh community evicted from Marston may have found a new site near Kidlington for a temple.

Joe Callaghan laid a foundation stone for a new library named after his grandfather, former Prime Minister James Callaghan, at Ruskin College. The Callaghan Library is part of a £5m refurbishment project.

The Cowley Road Carnival in South Park was on Sunday and seems to have been a success. @headingtonnews and @OxfordCityGuide posted these pictures. http://twitpic.com/5kos27 http://fb.me/UR8CPSOI

Re-tweets about a stolen husky dog filled my timeline on Sunday – here’s what to look out for.

Someone’s started using the twitter name @headington. He’s nothing to do with us – he’s from Hornsby. Not even Hornsby in Cumbria, but a suburb NW of Sydney, Australia. Seven tweets so far and all pushing a ‘Make money working from home’ scheme. So not very interesting then.

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

  • The Cavalier pub
  • Area Forum
  • Old Headington Conservation Area Appraisal Consultation
  • residential parking in the Radcliffe Hospital area
  • Noise complaints

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.

Planning woes.

TonyOX3

Councillor Ruth Wilkinson (@RuthWilk) tries hard to keep her twitter followers up to date with local planning issues. Today she posted a link to the document reporting comments on the draft Old Headington Conservation Area Appraisal. I looked at the document and despaired!

It is 21 pages long and seems to consist of just three detailed responses. Each response picks through the original document almost paragraph by paragraph and line by line, so repetition is inevitable. On such-and-such a point, Respondent 1 may say something, Respondent 2 may agree, disagree, or have no comment. But to see this you would have to be constantly hopping backwards and forwards in the document trying to collate the comments into a coherent whole.

Then we are not told who the Respondents are so we don’t know what if any vested interests they may have. I guess Ruskin College is one of them, the Friends of Old Headington may be another, I just don’t know. It implies that all respondents, individual or collective, are given equal weight. Similarly simple drafting suggestions are not distinguished from comments about major environmental issues.

I think the tedious pile of stuff people have to wade through to get any useful information is a major problem with our planning system. Communication of important facts doesn’t seem to be an objective. How on earth are our busy representatives supposed to have an informed debate about planning issues with documents like this as the basis for discussion? And unless they are acting on behalf of some pressure group ordinary members of the public just aren’t going to bother. It doesn’t say much for democracy – or, the cynic would say, is that the whole purpose? I’m sure it’s not, but …..