Headington Headlines #381

Your weekly round-up of local news for 13 – 19 August.

The City’s Executive Board agreed to introduce parking charges at Manor Place Farm, Marston (see HH380). The scheme now goes to the County for consideration and public consultation.

While the lower (western) section of Staunton Road is closed at Headley Way for Access to Headington work, SGN (Southern Gas Networks) is taking the opportunity to replace the gas mains in the road.

Oxonbike, the original bike rental scheme using docking stations, has closed blaming the emergence of the dockless bike schemes.

The mysteriously-disappearing planning application for an extension to the A&E Department at the JR Hospital has reappeared on the City Council’s website. Its reference number is 18/01851/FUL and the close of the consultation period has been put back to 15 September.

In other mysterious planning application news, the controversial Wychwood Lane development in Risinghurst lives on in a vegetative state. The ‘expiry date’ shown on the City’s website keeps being pushed back although nothing seems to be happening. The previous time I looked the date was 31 August; now it’s 15 September. The application itself was strangely omitted from the list of ‘forthcoming applications’ on the East Area Planning Committee’s agenda earlier this month. Is the new expiry date set to allow for the next EAPC meeting on 5 September, I wonder?

Another report of a sliced bike stand in Headington. Be careful where you leave your bikes!

My favourite Headington-related tweet:

There were no new posts on the Headington & Marston e-democracy forum this week.

Headington Headlines #379

Your weekly round-up of local news for 30 July – 5 August.

A woman was attacked and robbed in Ferry Road, Marston by a man wearing a Halloween mask or face paint. The attack took place shortly after midnight on Sunday 29 July. Police are appealing for witnesses.

Residents in Wood Farm will be consulted from mid-August to mid-September on a proposed CPZ (Controlled Parking Zone). If approved, the CPZ could come into effect as soon as next January.

A 200-year-old oak tree in Risinghurst has been deliberately poisoned and will have to be felled. The tree is in the playing fields at the top of Grovelands Road.

Independent shop Pen to Paper joined twitter. Welcome, @ToHeadington!

Brookes was given planning permisson for a new building on the site of the Helena Kennedy Building on the Headington Hill campus. As well as the usual conditions the architects must produce a ‘detailed Lighting Strategy’ to include ‘lighting contour plans’. This is to ensure that night-time visual intrusion is minimised.

I reported last week that OU Hospitals had made a planning application to enlarge the A&E Department at the JR. Mysteriously, the application disappeared from  the City’s planning website sometime on Monday and as I write still hasn’t reappeared. At the Headington Ward Focus meeting on Tuesday the Trust’s spokesperson from OUH Estates didn’t know about it and couldn’t offer any explanation. Local Councillors @RosalindRogers and @SGarden13 asked planning officers about it at the East Area Planning Committee the next day; they couldn’t explain it either.

Screenshot 1649 05/08/2018
Screenshot 1649 05/08/2018

There were no new posts on the Headington & Marston e-democracy forum this week.

Headington Headlines #378

Your weekly round-up of local news for 23 – 29 July .

A power cut affected about 2,000 homes in OX3 at 10pm on Tuesday evening.

Two new eateries for Headington. The Reina Grill, no longer the Coming Soon, opened next to Bury Knowle Park at the weekend, and Beirut, the new Lebanese restaurant on Osler Road where Jacob’s Brasserie used to be is expected to open on Monday (today).


Headington Action is behind a scheme to install ‘talking benches’ in Headington to give brief soundbites of local history. Weirdly, @TheOxfordMail thinks push-buttons and wind-up power is ‘futuristic’.

Plans for a two storey extension to the A&E department at the JR Hospital have been announced. The extension will add eight new A&E treatment bays, a paediatric resuscitation room, CT scanner, nurse base and improved bereavement rooms. The closing date for comments on the planning application (ref. 18/01851/FUL) is 27 August. [Update 31/07/2018: the planning application has disappeared from the Council’s website.]

Police carried out a drugs raid in Cecil Sharp Place on Saturday. Thanks to the local tweeps who identified the location.

I recommend the current exhibition in the Glass Tank at @Oxford_Brookes. It’s an exhibition of modern and contemporary wood block prints from Heilongjian Province in the north-east of China, and is sponsored by the Confucius Institute at Brookes @OBUConfucius. It’s open to the public, free, and runs from 0900 – 1700 Monday – Friday until 31 August.



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

  • No to racism in Bury Knowle Park – Community walk