Canalside appeal, August 12
Spring Residential have appealed against the refusal by city councillors of their controversial plans to build a four-storey development of 54 one- and two-bedroom flats on the canalside at Jericho, next to the listed St Barnabas church.
This proposal has aroused a storm of opposition. The City Council has received over 500 letters of objection. St Barnabas Church is opposed to the plans, as is the narrow-boating community, who still have no realistic offer for a suitable alternative site for their boatyard.
The Appeal is scheduled to take place over six working days (not Sat or Sun) from Tuesday 12 to Tuesday 19 August, from 10 a.m. to approximately 5pm, in the Town Hall, St Aldates.
Immediately before the Appeal opens on August 12, we will hold a silent demonstration. Please gather outside the Town Hall from 8.30 a.m. We hope as many people as possible will come along for an hour or so to demonstrate our opposition to Spring’s plans.
The outcome of the appeal will be decided by a Planning Inspector, who will hear evidence presented by barristers for both sides. In cooperation with the City Council, the Jericho Community Association, the Jericho Community Boatyard and the Jericho Living Heritage Trust are co-ordinating the case for rejection of the plans.
Spring's drawing of the block to the right Spring's plans for the redevelopment of the land behind St Barnabas Church were unanimously rejected on 11 December 2007 by the Central South and West Area Committee. In all there were nine reasons for refusal. In addition to those proposed by the officers, the councillors added five more. The evening started with protests outside the town hall. The ensuring meeting, chaired by Jericho Councillor, Colin Cook, was packed and noisy, and heard strong statements against the proposal from among other, Philip Pullman, John Keyes for the Jericho Community Boatyard, and Charlotte Christie for the Jericho Community Association. Spring had four representatives at the meeting but they declined to speak.
The main objections were: the lack of provision for a new boatyard, since the owners of the land in Yarnton are refusing to use it for this purpose; the failure to offer 50% affordable housing, the height and design of the new buildings which were generally considered ugly; and the failure to meet environmental standards.
In addition to the drawings presented by Spring there was also a display of of a computer simulation of the proposals commissioned by the Community Association. This was based on the dimensions and plans submitted by Spring. The slideshow below shows a selection of these. Pressing the button to the far right will take you to the next slide. Pressing the one in the middle will start an automatic display of the slides, which you can press again to stop.
If you cannot see a particular slide, such as the first one, put the number in the box and press your Enter key. To display the slideshow your browser will need the Adobe Flash player installed.
Note:
• All views are taken at standing height (1.65m) with 60% field of view and equivalent to 30mm camera lens.
• They should be interpreted within the general limits of accuracy and realism of a computer model
• Existing and proposed buildings have been modelled using Studio Viz software.
• Heights of existing eaves, ridges etc have been taken from survey drawings forming part of the planning application wherever shown.
• Other heights where not surveyed, are modelled as best estimates interpreted from photographs and site inspections.
• Ground level has been modelled as a single plane (surveyed / real ground levels vary slightly).
• Textures, materials and fine detail (such as existing windows and doors) have not been modelled.
• Proposed flats have been modelled from drawings forming part of the planning application.
• Not all surrounding areas have been modelled
Spring’s proposal must be one of Oxford’s most unpopular planning applications. The Council received over 600 letters of objection. This includes one from George Ferguson, former president of the Royal Institute of British Architects. Mr. Ferguson said: “The current application is based on the false premise that this is just another canalside residential scheme. It is a special site with its special history and activity as a working boatyard. The proposed development and its uninspiring public space totally fails to reflect this or to incorporate the sort of uses that will attract the traditional waterside activity that this site calls for.”
This redevelopment site has had a long and tortuous history. The most recent phase started in August 2005 when a planning inspector turned down an appeal against the refusal of a planning application by Bellway Homes. Bellway had bought the land from British Waterways subject to planning permission. So when this was refused the site again came up for sale. Spring Residential, which is a subsidiary of Castlemore, then bought the land unconditionally, so it is theirs whether or not this application succeeds.
When it looked as though the sale was going through, British Waterways in May 2006 forcibly evicted a group of boaters who had occupied the site of what had earlier been a boatyard. There had been two main reasons why Bellway lost their appeal. One was that the Inspector concluded that this part of the canal needed facilities for lifting out boats and for repair and maintenance. He said that British Waterways had to provide them on this site or in another “equally accessible and suitable location”. Since then the boaters have been in discussions with British Waterways, but have yet to agree a location. You can get the latest news on this from the website of Jericho Community Boatyard .
The second reason why the appeal failed, indeed the main one, was that Bellway had contributed no land for a new Jericho Community Centre. In his report, the Inspector pointed out that the new ‘local plan’ for Oxford requires that a new Centre be built on the site. He noted that for this purpose the Council had offered to contribute adjacent land in Dawson Place that is currently occupied by garages.
But he concluded that this would not be enough. Bellway had argued that they could not give any land as this would mean they would not make enough profit from the development. But, as the Inspector put it: “I see no reason why need for a land contribution would unduly inhibit development on the appeal site nor why a suitable and viable scheme accommodating the Community Centre requirement would not be forthcoming.”
The complete decision of the Planning Inspector
is available here 
as
a 0.2 Mb Acrobat pdf file.
The land for the new Jericho Community Centre would come from combining two areas: 1) the site of the Council-owned garages in Dawson Place; 2) a contribution from the adjacent site made available by the developer. This drawing is intended to give only a rough indication of the area. Any new developer would thus have to offer some land for the Centre. When it became clear that the preferred developer was Spring Residential the Jericho Community Association then started negotiating with them over a suitable area. We have now agreed with them the contribution of a piece of land indicated in the plan above that they will offer, should the development go ahead. The Community Association has exchanged contracts with Spring to secure this land for the community.
We have also been preparing ‘indicative’ plans for what the new Centre would contain and what it might look like in preparation for submitting an outline planning application in the near future. These will establish the use of the site for community and associated uses but not show the detailed internal layout. We have had extensive negotiations with Spring over how the two sites would work together. Naturally there will be full consultations with the community on the details, when we will present initial proposals and then hold a public meeting for you to give your own ideas.
Meanwhile Spring’s planning application reflects this land contribution. Whether their overall residential development application succeeds or not is, of course, another matter and for the Planning Inspector to decide.