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 #373

Your weekly round-up of local news for 18 – 24 June.

The advisory cycle tracks at the top end of Headley Way have been removed and the central white line shifted. ‘Cyclists Dismount’ signs appeared but after protests they were removed on Tuesday afternoon. The County highways engineers said they had been mistakenly left after some earlier work for which they were needed.

County Councillor Glynis Phillips (Barton, Sandhills & Risinghurst) is pressing for the right turn from the A40 into Collinwood Road to be re-opened for the duration of the sewer repair works which have closed Green Road. She says temporary traffic lights would prevent the kind of accidents which happened on the A40 before the junction was closed.

The closure of the Six Bells pub in Quarry is confirmed. Greene King are looking for new tenants.

Back in November last year, shortly after the new Westgate opened, I wrote a critical article about the lack of cycle parking spaces at the new development. I was sceptical about whether the promised number of spaces required under Westgate’s planning conditions would ever be provided. Now eight months later it seems the requirement might almost have been met. Exact numbers are still uncertain, but the Oxford Mail reports Cyclox as being fairly happy with the latest situation.

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

  • Chinese Dance and Martial Arts at Oxford Festival of the Arts

Latest News from Narnia

I noted at the end of last month in HH367 that nothing seemed to have happened for 18 months on the planning application to build next to the C S Lewis Nature Reserve on a plot in Wychwood Lane, Risinghurst. The original story is in my article “Border Skirmish in Narnia“.

One of the unsatisfactory aspects of the application was that it is made in the name of “The Wychwood Foundation”, an organisation that didn’t exist then and still doesn’t exist now. I say it doesn’t exist: it isn’t a registered charity, nor is it registered at Companies House. Search engines only know about it in the context of this planning application. It is not the same as any of several other “Wychwood” organisations including the Wychwood Project and the Wychwood Trust. Nevertheless, the Wychwood Foundation’s planning application seeks charitable exemption from the statutory development levy (CIL).

Then last week someone who had used the services of Beecher Accoustics sent me this letter they had received. The Beechers are the people behind the non-existent Foundation and here describe themselves as Trustees. One of the several bizarre things about the letter is the invitation to buy a 6 bedroom house adjacent to the plot they want to develop. The house is the one at the top of Lewis Close, number 7, which features in the planning application. This shows an access road into the development alongside this house in Lewis Close rather than from Wychwood Lane (where the Beechers live). I’ve looked at several online property sites and it looks as though the house is not on the open market. Do the Beechers actually own this house as well as the house they gave as their address 18 months ago, 4 Wychwood Lane? If they do own it, why isn’t it on the market? If they don’t own it, what are they doing inviting offers? Obviously it would help their cause if the owners of 7 Lewis Close were supporters of their plans rather than opponents, but what do they expect to happen if someone gets their letter and says they are interested in buying number 7?

Eighteen months ago the Beechers were, and still are, Director and Secretary of Beecher Accoustics Limited, registered at 1 Quarry High Street. Earlier this year (31 January) a new company called Quarry Mews Ltd was incorporated with the Beechers as Director and Secretary, together with a William Blackham, B H G Gadhoke and H Gadhoke. This new company is also registered at 1 Quarry High Street. It gives its nature of business as “Development of building projects”. The Gadhokes in turn are directors of, among other interests, Red Kite Property Investments Ltd which has an address in Lighwater, Surrey. It looks as if the Beechers have taken some partners on board to help progress their plans.

Meanwhile there still doesn’t seem to be any movement towards the planning application coming forward for consideration. It will be interesting to see what happens when it does finally surface at the East Area Planning Committee.

Footnote: Companies House information downloaded from their website on 15 May 2018.