Author Archives: adminimport

Letter to the Oxford Diocese from Doric

A snippet from appendix 10.1 of the ES Addendum (Doric’s amendments), a letter to the Oxford Diocesan Board of Finance (owners of St Peter and St Paul church and vicarage);

“The development proposals for Botley District Centre have also been revised to enable a greater provision of age-restricted residential accommodation to be brought forward at the western end of the site. There are now 50 apartments – a mix of 1 and 2 Bedrooms – which now exceeds the total net floor area compared to the present accommodation it will replace whilst still enjoying related communal garden amenity space for the residents.

“A consequence of this amendment is that it is no longer feasible to re-provide the Vicarage within the application site.”

 

Dorics Plans – Do my old comments still apply?

I had a letter from a resident wondering if this consultation, the third about the Doric plans, will still consider previously submitted comments. I thought if one person had this question, others might too.

Here’s the question:

Do the (900+) objection letters submitted in the last round still carry weight or is the new application by Doric seen by the authorities as separate? In other words, if there are fewer objection letters this time round, will the assumption be that there is less opposition?

Here’s my reply:

All the previous objections still stand–it’s still the same application.

The idea is that Doric may think they’ve addressed some of the material planning considerations raised so far. So we can comment on that, or on anything else actually.

Basically, if you have something new to add, log another comment.

Vale planning officers fully understand how unpopular this proposal is. What they track is the essence of the objection. If enough of them aren’t addressed, there’s a better chance it will be refused.

(What I meant in that last line was if enough of the material planning considerations raised so far aren’t addressed by Doric in their amendments, then those material considerations are still valid, and are reasons for refusal.)

 

The cases FOR and AGAINST student housing in Botley

Oxford Mail covered Doric’s amended plans from the objectors’ perspective before Doric had sent out their blurbs. (And, by the way, what ever happened to those public presentations Doric scheduled then cancelled at the last minute?)

Read the article and (the good) comments here: http://bit.ly/1pWis5I

To the person who Commented that Doric might know more than I do about the case for student housing, they should read the reports for themselves.

Case for (submitted this week by Doric): Doric’s Report – Oxford demand report FINAL

Case against: Potters Report – Case Against Student Housing in Botley

The former  report is an exercise in truth by assertion. Doric says they strongly believe that Oxford students want to live in Botley, and that Oxford City’s need for student housing can be satisfied in Botley.  There’s no evidence of that, zero, none. Just a very strong opinion, stated just like that (‘very strong opinion’) several times.

The latter report by Dr Caroline Potter is evidence based.

Hey, don’t take my word for it. Read them and decide for yourself.

Doric’s Deeply Unfortunate Scheme (letter)

I had a letter from a resident this week that I thought provided such an excellent precis of this Doric/Mace/ToryVale/WestWay situation, that I asked them if I could publish their letter here. They said yes, but declined attribution.

Dear Cllr Hallett

I moved to Elm’s Rise with my partner three years ago. It’s a lovely place to live. I’ve found the politics of the place and the Council’s apparent priorities to be, shall we say, rather surprising after living in {snip}. Your communications have been tremendously helpful to my awareness of the issues we face living here.

Sadly, but inevitably, I will now rant on about Doric for a little bit!

Thanks for the update about the revisions to the West Way centre application, for posting Mace’s patronising and self-important response to a constituent on your blog and for the work you are putting in to try and get some sense around this deeply unfortunate scheme. I’ve found the behaviour of the developers absolutely jaw-dropping in its unprofessionalism and contempt for both the local community and sensible planning. Sadly I’ve found it impossible to work out whether the failings of this scheme are due to negligence on the part of the DC or the hubris of inexperienced developers. A good measure of both I suspect.

Looking briefly at some of the documentation in the revised plans a couple of things struck me. In their EA they discounted the refurbishment of the existing centre because a large supermarket would impact the current centre. Now they provide a Southampton University/Tesco report that supports large supermarkets as beneficial to current centres, I think to justify their traffic projections, but ironically evidence for exploring the popular option that they discounted in their EA.

Then they state in the response to the Design Review that the quantum of uses is necessary because of the complexity and scale of the project, thus implicitly refuting objections to scale or evidence of need; a complexity and scale which by all accounts has been pushed only by themselves.

And they’ve provided the planning ruling on the massive out of town development at Rushden Lakes. So I guess in some way at least they acknowledge what this has never been about the redevelopment of a local centre.

So frustrating.

 

Doric’s latest amendments are online

They just came up on the website this morning, and are still undergoing checking and re-organisation. You can see them here in the Amendments folder: http://www.whitehorsedc.gov.uk/java/support/Main.jsp?MODULE=ApplicationDetails&REF=P13/V2733/FUL

I think one good place to start is with the Design & Access Statement Addendum here: http://www.whitehorsedc.gov.uk/java/support/dynamic_serve.jsp?ID=328297503&CODE=05CE7BB6C9CA1A96204DEF38D05F51BA

Although there are typos and some errors of fact (the Design Panel was on 2 June 14, not 18 June 14 as this doc states), hopefully they aren’t anything material. Further study will show if there are important errors. If you find glaring errors that might bear on this planning decision, bring them to the attention of Vale officer, or to West Way Concern, who will be sure it’s handled.

But this doc lists all the changes, and plots them on a site map. It also explains the reasons for the changes.

Deadline for comments is officially 29 Sept, but there is some leniency in this. So plan for that date, and don’t worry too much if you go over by a few days.