OXFORD City Council is proposing to build an 8,000-home settlement stretching over 600 acres of Green Belt land on the edge of the city.
The council is ready to release a huge city council-owned site to create a settlement that would be as large as Blackbird Leys and Greater Leys combined.
The proposal means the controversial scheme to build 3,500 homes south of Grenoble Road could be more than doubled, with the development stretching from Sandford in the west to Garsington Road in the east. Until now, the issue of an urban extension of Oxford has focused on a 370-acre site next to Grenoble Road and Oxford Science Park, owned by Magdalen College and Thames Water.
But it has emerged that the city council wants to add 250 acres of neighbouring green field land, which would allow the settlement to stretch eastwards far beyond Magdalen's proposed boundary. The city council disclosed the full extent of its ambitions in its formal response to Oxfordshire County Council's consultation on where 21,000 new homes should be built in the county. The city council says the area could absorb all 8,000 homes that County Hall says must be built on greenfield land between 2016 and 2026, as part of the South East Plan.
The council's strategy document, which is expected to be approved by the city council executive on Monday, says "appropriate facilities" would have to be built for such a large community, with Oxford Green Belt having to be revised. But the council insists that the scheme "will leave 99 per cent of the Oxford Green Belt intact".
The new settlement would avoid thousands of new homes having to be built at Bicester, Didcot and Grove - the county council's preferred option - which the city council says are being bitterly opposed in towns which needed "time to draw breath" after experiencing phenomenal growth since 1991. But the city council strategy document only refers vaguely to "land south of Grenoble Road" failing to specify that its own land was being offered for development.
Alex Hollingsworth, the city council's leader, said: "Oxfordshire is in urgent need of more housing. The issue is where should the houses go. The most sensible place is where they are most needed and the most sensible place to put the new housing is on the edge of Oxford."
Mr Hollingsworth said the city council had always had its own land in mind when referring to "land south of Grenoble Road". He said: "We were always referring to the whole area not just the bit owned by Magdalen College. It makes sense to look at the area as a whole with a development of this size. Our analysis suggests that 8,000 is a reasonable total."
Mr Hollingsworth said any money the council made would be ploughed in to provide social housing to help combat the city's chronic housing shortage. The council would seek to ensure that at least half the new homes were earmarked for social housing. The land, which is farmed, falls within the South Oxfordshire District Council area.
SODC chief executive, David Buckle, said: "A cynic might wonder whether this is why Oxford City Council has been promoting this development all along. Is it in the interest of Oxford, or has the whole thing been underpinned by the fact that the city council, as a significant landowner, stands to make a huge amount of money from this?" He warned the city not to overlook the fact that south Oxfordshire residents would have first call on any social housing under existing rules, if the development went ahead.
Magdalen and Thames Water published new details of their scheme only three weeks ago, showing a settlement with two new schools, a community centre with shops and a new park-and-ride. But Magdalen bursar, Charles Young, welcomed the city council's decision to press for a vastly-enlarged scheme. "The council endorsed the general proposition of developing land south of Grenoble Road 18 months ago. It is appropriate that there should be different options put forward as to the actual size. We see this as a useful contribution to the debate. I cannot see any difference between what the city council is saying and what we are saying."
Elizabeth Gillespie, of The Baldons Parish Council, said: "The whole thing is a nightmare. It is hard to believe that when the idea was first spoken of we were talking about a few hundred houses. We are at the beginning of a roller-coaster. People should remember Brasenose College also owns land in this area."
Debbie Dance, director of Oxford Preservation Trust, said: "This has come as news to us. But it does not matter who owns the land. The examination in public of the County Structure Plan came to the conclusion that there was no need to build in the Green Belt. That is still our view."