OXFORD University's Magdalen College believes an unstoppable momentum is building behind plans for 3,000 new homes on Green Belt land stretching from Sandford-on-Thames to Greater Leys.
Senior bursar Charles Young said the college viewed this week's decision by Oxfordshire County Council's executive to leave the scheme out of the draft Structure Plan - which sets out developments planned until 2016 - as only a setback.
He said: "This is not Magdalen College making the case for an urban extension of Oxford. The case is being made by a huge swathe of opinion right across Oxford, including business, the university and the city council. We hope to he able to act as a catalyst. Ultimately, I believe this is going to happen. It is deliverable and will demonstrably bring real benefits to the city, addressing all sorts of problems. There is a huge housing need in Oxford. There are 6,000 people on the housing list, with one in 20 schoolchildren living in accommodation provided for the homeless."
"If you do not have housing where people want it, not only will you have considerable social deprivation, you will have a constraint on economic growth. Most of the infrastructure is already there. It is the natural development of what already exists."
The college, which owns much of the land, is confident the 320-acre site near Oxford United's Kassam Stadium offers the only realistic answer to the city's chronic shortage of affordable housing. Its long-term plan for the site would see a new community on the outskirts of the city with two schools, shops, a new park-and-ride and a huge expansion of Oxford Science Park.
County council leader Keith Mitchell himself expects the development to eventually go ahead. He said: "I think Magdalen is probably right. I see a lot of merit in this site. It is not a beautiful bit of countryside. It is a natural extension of the city. I suspect we will have to look at the whole Green Belt and there may have to be some give and take. "
The three-phase Magdalen scheme, introduced with joint owners of the site Thames Water, would eventually require the costly relocation of the sewage treatment works to a site east of Sandfordbrake Farm. The first phase would see 1,000 homes built, a new access road created on the A4074 to ease traffic flow through Sandford, and a new park and ride for drivers approaching Oxford from the south.
The college and Oxfordshire Chamber of Commerce is urging county councillors to reconsider the decision to drop the scheme when the full council meets on April 6. Chamber president Keith Slater said: "The decision is bad for business and, because it again throws extra pressure on county towns, bad for transport and the environment. If the county council shows it cannot be trusted to make tough strategic decisions, the case for it retaining control of the Structure Plan process is hard to argue."
reg.little@nqo.com