The Head of City Development has submitted a report which seeks to review the Council’s current position in respect of planning permission 11/02881/FUL for graduate student accommodation at Castle Mill, Roger Dudman Way following the petition to Council on 17^th December 2012.

Officer recommendation: That the Committee NOTE the report.

The Head of City Development submitted a report (previously circulated now appended) which reviewed the Council’s current position in respect of planning permission 11/02881/FUL for graduate student accommodation at Castle Mill, Roger Dudman Way following the petition to Council on 17^th December 2012.

The Committee noted that Sushila Dhall, Mark Davis and Toby Porter (Campaign to Protect Port Meadow), Alison Cobb (Freeman of Oxford), Sietske Boeles, Adrian Arbib, Father Jonathan (St Joseph Church), Richard Laurence-Wilson, Sarah Murphy and Edward Surridge spoke on the report.

The speakers made the following points:

The consultation process was not good enough; the process needs to be improved.

Planting more trees is not effective mitigation for the height of the building, it will not bring back the skyline only removing the top two storeys of the development will save the skyline.

Planting the wrong type of trees will damage wetlands. Council should suspend the planting scheme.

The development is an act of vandalism, it has ruined tourism and the views of the city from Port Meadow

We need to halt development to preserve Port Meadow for future generations. Although revoking permission could be very expensive, the chance of the developer ordering costs is zero due to the embarrassment of the development.

The Committee made the following points:

It is upsetting that the developer has not turned up to speak as it would have been interesting to get their point of view.

What effectively has been built is compliant with the permission but we are unsure about the effectiveness of the mitigation (tree planting) scheme.

Council needs to review how we look at these big developments, the pre-application stage consultation and the process of decision making.

Can't revoke permission, we need to commission some work, explore options and discuss with developer.

The Committee resolved (by 8 votes to 0) to NOTE the report of the Head of City Development:  Roger Dudman Way: 11/02881/FUL

·        To instruct the Head of City Development to negotiate with the University of Oxford in order to ameliorate the size and impact of the development given planning permission under 11/02881/FUL

·        To instruct the Head of City Development to submit a report back to this Committee at the earliest opportunity on the progress of his negotiations, and by the scheduled April 2013 meeting at the latest

·        To establish a working party, to include members of local amenity groups as well as members and officers, to recommend to the Council any changes to procedures or policies which the process of handling and determining the application 11/02881/FUL (including the pre-application and consultation stages) might suggest would be desirable.