Headington Headlines #355

TonyOX3

Your weekly round-up of local news for 29 January – 4 February.

Redrow has been selected as the builder for the next phase of @BartonPark_. The company is on twitter as @RedrowHomes.

Winvic contractors are still flouting their permitted working procedures and causing problems in Latimer Road. This is just one of several tweets about it from @LeonardoLoredan.

I’m not going to rant about the disgraceful lack of transparency of the Oxfordshire Growth Board, but it apparently met in closed session on Thursday to discuss the delayed Access to Headington work under a disguised agenda item. @RuthWilk reports “individual projects are not likely to be announced till the 7th February. So the planned and published Staunton Road closure may still go ahead”.

The rather decrepit old bridge over the Cherwell at the Parks end of the path through Mesopotamia has been replaced with a smart new one.

The temporary surgical theatre outside the JR Women’s Centre has been removed. It was originally put there to provide more capacity after the downgrading of maternity services at Banbury Horton. Hopefully something more permanent has been provided in the main building.

The driver of a Land Rover Discovery tried to ram-raid the Aldi on Horspath Driftway on Saturday night. Apparently the cash machine was the target. Police are appealing for information.

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

    • Concerns re parking prices in Headington
    • Reply re Barton Park
    • Police crime statistics for Oxford and personal theft: a question
    • Politics on the forum
    • Beech House

Headington Headlines #354

TonyOX3

Your weekly round-up of local news for 22 – 28 January.

The County Council has published a road closure notice in connection with the postponed Access to Headington work on Headley Way. It gives a start date of 12 February. According to @RuthWilk the work will go ahead if the Oxfordshire Growth Board agrees (and finds the money) on 1 Feb.

Churchill Ward Councillor Susan Brown @SusanBr86682854 has been elected as the new leader of Oxford City Council. She will take up her post as Bob Price retires next month. Linda Smith @LabLinda75, Blackbird Leys, is Deputy Leader elect.

Oxford Brookes published their plans for a development of 350 homes on their Wheatley Campus site. The site is in South Oxfordshire DC. They have applied for outline planning permission (ref P17/S4254/O); follow the link to see the documents and comments.

Illustrative layout
Illustrative layout
Image: gva.co.uk

It turned out that the tortoise found at Cheney School last week was none other than Tallulah, reported missing from a house on Old Road six months ago. Her incredible 322 metre journey made the national press.

A temporary building was installed in front of the A&E Department at the JR on Sunday. It will accommodate a GP surgery aiming to filter out arrivals who do not need full hospital treatment.

Bill Heine collected his Certificate of Merit on friday.

The latest set of nominations for the City’s Heritage Asset Register has been published and is open for public consultation. OX3 is well represented in this batch – details here.

I wrote a piece about a marketing shot that has gone round locally from Pharmacy2U which tries to persuade you to order your repeat prescriptions through them. I invite you to read the article before deciding whether or not to use them.

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

  • How do we get County to fix this ongoing flooding?
  • Reply re Barton park
  • Beech House
  • Concerns re parking prices in Headington

Heritage Asset Register nominations

TonyOX3

The City’s Heritage Asset Register (HAR) covers those parts of the environment that we value for their historic, archaeological, artistic and architectural interest. Many locally valued assets are not listed buildings, conservation areas or scheduled ancient monuments. By keeping an HAR the Council can manage them through their planning policies.

The next tranche of nominations for the Oxford HAR has been published and will be open for public consultation from next week. Here are the places in OX3 that are being considered:

  • 8th Oxford (Headington) Scout Hut, (formerly All Saints Mission Chapel)
  • All Saints Church, Lime Walk
  • Church of St Francis of Assisi, Hollow Way
  • Cuckoo Lane
  • Hillsboro, No. 14 Holyoake Road (Former home of C S Lewis and Mrs Moore)
  • No. 18 Windsor Street and 6 Perrin Street (former New Headington Infant School)
  • No. 85 (All Saints Vicarage), Old Road, South side
  • South Park
  • The Somerset Public House, Marston Road
  • Warneford Meadow

You can find the complete list of nominations including links to the nomination forms, and a link to the Register as it currently stands on the Council website.

The Council says:

The online consultation will be available for comment from 29th January until 26th February via our website. Alternatively, if you wish to submit comments on a nomination in writing, please send it to Planning Policy, Oxford City Council, St Aldate’s Chambers, 109 St Aldate’s, Oxford, OX1 1DS by 1st March so that these can be presented to the Planning Committees. Hard copies of the nomination forms are available at the Customer Service Centre at the Oxford City Council Offices, St. Aldates.