I just had a lovely phone call to thank me for all the work I’d done on West Way. The caller was surprised at the committee outcome, but observed that all the councillors at the committee meeting were attentive and wanting to make the right decision. (Except for one who seemed to be falling asleep. But that one did raise the hand to say, ‘Against’, so never mind.)

Lots of people seem very surprised at this result.

Lots have people have expressed their beliefs about this West Way scenario. Here are some things I’ve heard or read in the past weeks and months:

• Vale will ensure planning permission goes through
• It’s a done deal
• I don’t trust any elected councillors
• Vale must be corrupt, to decide on an application where they benefit financially
• Vale are about to lose Botley to Oxford City so they have to get their money out of it
• There’s a conspiracy between the Vale and Doric
• All councillors are crooked
• Money in it for the councillors
• Party politics decide everything
• No democracy in the Vale

Did you think any of these things, or perhaps others I haven’t mentioned? If you did, what do you think now?

I think a surprise result in life can be an opportunity to examine your beliefs. What exactly were you suprised at? Please take a look at that. Why were you surprised? What belief did you hold that was shown to be mistaken? Where were you wrong? Is there anyone you need to apologise to? Is there anyone you need to forgive? Is there anyone you need to thank?

Hey. I don’t mean to lecture you. I mean to share with you what I do in the face of a surprise. Things that have surprised me around this include:

• Doric turning in sloppy designs and data. Even the slide they left up for most of the planning meeting had “Botley Distrct Centre” [sic]. They did finally update their drawings to change “Burger’s” to “Signage”. If these minor matters caught my eye, the major goofs were caught by objectors.
• Doric lying about me and refusing to make it right. I consider myself a pretty square shooter; I expect to be met the same way. That was surprising, disappointing and made me angry.
• Doric failing to realise how offensive they were being. Their reference to Botley as a ‘brownfield’, needing ‘regeneration’. Calling it an exciting plan. Saying universities were excited, residents were excited, businesses were excited. That surprised me. I expected more of a realistic, pragmatic approach instead of a deep-pocket PR machine.
• Cllr Batts continuing to support Doric in spite of such huge opposition from the community he was elected to represent. I still don’t get that. And why he used his time at the committee meeting to give us a history of West Way. A surprise, and a puzzle.
• That all the supermarkets said they weren’t interested, and Doric maintained until the end that they had one on board.
• Matthew Barber refused to consider that he had made a bad mistake in choosing this deal and this developer, and to look for viable exit strategies.

Other things disappointed me. But that has more to do with me having unrealistic expectations of others. I can learn from that too. But that’s more than compensated for by the thousands of ways my expectations were exceeded. What a great community to be a part of!

I wasn’t surprised at the final result. I did a lot of talking to a lot of people and felt fairly sure the committee would do the right thing. Botley is a lot like Grove (v near Wantage) in size and purpose; we are the two Local Service Centres of the Vale. And those committee members who were unfamilar with Botley first hand, were defo familliar with Grove.

I didn’t feel confident to come out and say I was optimistic on the night (OMG, what if I was wrong?). But I DID say to those around me, “I am hopeful.”

What have you learnt about yourself or your world from this experience? I’d like to hear if you’d like to share.

The Planning Committee met on Wednesday night to consider Doric’s plans for Botley and decide what our future will look like. Or, WON’T look like, in this case. Doric’s plans were refused unanimously; the final vote was 13-0.

I have a lot of thoughts about the whole process, and what I’ve learned, what this community and West Way Community Concern have learned. I saw so many courageous and compassionate people live up to very high expectations, and some people not manage to do that at all. Some people were able to put party politics aside and come to just and fair conclusions; others weren’t. Some people had a lot of influence behind the sceens, and won’t get enough recognition for it. Others were visible and did their work out in the public eye. Everyone played their part and we got the right result.

At the end of it all, we got to see what people stand for. And the result was heartwarming; most people stand for community, for localism, for democracy. They stand for kindness, and fairness, and effectiveness. Even the poor Vale Cabinet decision making couldn’t destroy a vibrant community.

Do you have high expectations of people to step up, when called, and do the right thing? I do. Generally those expectations are met. There are very few people who simply want to hurt others (I’ve seen those too) but most people want to help others and to do the right thing. These people deserve our thanks.

I’m so pleased at the outcome. At the same time, I want to explore the path we took so that the good and effective practises we learned in this effort (was it a year and a half?) can be assimilated into the next Main Thing.

It’s not often I get to see karma within a short enough timespan to recognise it. This was gratifying.

17 Nov 14 Update. I received the answers. Mostly, they tell me that my questions aren’t material planning considerations. Of course I know this; they are material community concerns. Our second greatest fear (after the fear of them demolishing the centre of Botley to build this behemoth) is that they will build it and it will fail, leaving us without the resources we need to support our little community. Therefore it’s relevant to us whether they have a food store operator, whether Mace are the student housing operators due to the fact that no other operator would take it on (because the universities have said they won’t send their students here!), whether they’ve consulted with stakeholders outside Vale of White Horse, such as  Oxford City, or the two universities. They say in their docs that this development is not for the benefit of Botley or the Vale, but to benefit the City of Oxford. Therefore, they should have been working closely with the city and both of the universities to create a solution. They didn’t talk to either of them. Here you go. Have a read.

Botley Questions from Cllr Roberts and Cllr Hallet 13 11 _1

On 7 October 2014, Vale Planning Officers hosted a Development Forum for the various stakeholders of the West Way Redevelopment scheme to come together to get questions answered.

On the night, we ran over the alloted time. Those of us toward the end of the agenda asked our questions, but there wasn’t time to answer them there. We were promised a written reply from Doric within 10 days. I haven’t had my reply yet, and have now chased it, twice. Most recently, I’ve been promised I’ll have my answers next week.

I thought you’d be interested to see what I asked.

West Way Questions for Tues 7 Oct 14

1. It appears that no Oxford City Council reps have been invited today. ES Vol I claims that student housing in Botley would be a Major Benefit, city-wide (not for Botley). There is no evidence that Oxford City Council has been consulted at all on the student accommodation. Why are none of those stakeholders present here?

2. What discussions have been held, with whom, at Oxford City Council about this plan, and with what outcomes?

3. What discussions have Doric/Mace held with the two universities regarding demand for  525 student rooms  in Botley for their students,  and with what outcomes?

4. Doric say frequently the reason for student housing in Botley is to free up family homes currently occupied by students. What is their estimate of the number of student houses in Botley – thinking of their recent Saville Report?

5. Could Doric/Mace comment on affordability of their proposed student housing.

6. Specifically, what level of rent, at 2014/15 prices, would Mace expect to be charged for (a) a room in a cluster and (b) a `standard’ studio, and for what length(s) of contract?

7. Oxford City policy requires that developers of new student housing contribute a sum to affordable housing elsewhere in the city. Vale has no such policies, because we have no policy for student housing, because we don’t have student housing here. How does the applicant see their responsibility to offset this high number of student housing with contributions to the true housing needs of the community? How is proposal not an attempt to circumvent City Policies by building in Botley?

8. SMP p.6 states that the development `has been designed and configured to provide communal space for the students upon the podium.’ Given the size of the proposed student population, how is this compatible with the piazza area  being for the whole community?

9. What’s the biggest building in Abingdon, and how does this plan compare in height and length? Wantage and Grove? These are the two biggest centres in the Vale.

10. Who is the food store operator?

11. Who is your student housing operator? When I Googled “Graduation Management Services” I got no results.

12. How big is the superstore compared to Waitrose in Abingdon? (It’s hard for average person to visualise what 8100 sq m actually looks like, but most of us have been to Abingdon Waitrose.)

I had this from David Buckle this evening:

How Tall? Balloons tried to show, but the gusty breezes prevented them rising to the full height of 8 stories right up next to the road. 11Oct 14 (click on photo to enlarge)

For those Conservatives (and anyone else) whining about how the Lib Dems have politicised this issue of the Doric deal for West Way redevelopment, I have three things to say about it. OK, four things.

First: In 2011, the Lib Dems (in power at the Vale), in collaboration with other property owners, listed Site 1 for sale for development, with some of the proceeds to be used to improve West Way Shopping Centre. (Site 1 is the extended corner of West Way and Westminster Way, comprising the Baptist Church, Seacourt Hall, Grant Thornton, part of the Co-op and all of its car park, and the Elms Court building (library, flats, bank and dry cleaners)). There were 13 bidders on the short list to buy Site 1.

Second: Then came the 2011 election, and we (the voters) elected a Tory majority in the Vale. One of the first decisions the Tories made was to sell Site 1 to Doric. That was quickly followed by a decision to sell Site 2 to Doric as well. They also decided to make the sale of both sites contingent on Doric gaining planning permission for a larger scheme, extending beyond site 1 and Site 2, that demolished the entire centre of Botley, both businesses and residences.

Third: Since then, your local Lib Dems have been working with this community to get the Tories to Drop the Doric sale deal. We have presented petitions to the Vale, tabled motions to full council of the Vale, and provided information to the newspapers. The Tories have refused to do anything to help. Your local Tory Vale councillor has been heard on the radio alongside Doric, giving his support to their plan for Botley. Our Tory MP, Nicola Blackwood, is opposed to the the plans. I don’t know what happens on the inside of the Tory party, but clearly they aren’t united in what they stand for.

Finally:  Vale officers are employed to implement the wishes of Cabinet, and they do that very capably. There’s only one way to ensure we get the Vale to listen to the residents and business owners of Botley and drop the sale to Doric, and that’s to vote differently in May 2015.

Conclusion: The decision to sell West Way, with the decision to make that sale conditional on Doric successfully gaining planning permission for the scheme to demolish the heart of Botley and build the behemoth that is proposed, IS political. It isn’t being politicised by the Lib Dems. That’s a #logicfail. Tories are trying to bamboozle the public. Don’t fall for it.

Here’s an objection not like any other of the over 1000 received. (No, not that Stephen Fry. This one lives in Oxford and his dentist is in Elms Parade.)

I’ve uploded it as a pdf just as if it were a jpg (that’s supposed to work).

Click on it to read it. Jolly good.

Stephen Fry objection

There are less than three weeks to go until the Vale Planning Committee decide about the Doric plans for West Way.

Tonight, West Way Concern are presenting a petition to the planning committee. It has 1000 people asking planning committee to refuse permission for this unwanted and inappropriate scheme.

Dr Caroline Potter is presenting it — I’ll try to get a copy of her speech and put it here. Here’s a link to her speech: https://westwayconcern.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/wwcc-petition-presentation-22nd-october-2014.pdf

I wish I had  photo to share!