03-08-2025
Oxford planning roundup: new homes, hotel accommodation and HMOs
Plans for a huge new housing development, hotel accommodation and new HMOs have been submitted to Oxford City Council planning officers this week.
A 90-home development for Iffley Mead was put forward by Oxfordshire County Council, who own the land.
The homes would be built on a former playing field next to The Iffley Academy, which has been fenced off and left in an overgrown state.
It used to be owned by St Augustine of Canterbury School, which was closed in 2005.
(Image: Google Street View) The site lies near Iffley Meadow, where the city council want to build up to 32 homes, which faced strong opposition from locals.
Friends of the Fields Iffley was set up to oppose the plans, and a petition to save the fields has gained more than 60,000 signatures, and more than 1,000 objections to the plans were submitted to the planning portal in 2022.
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A change of use application for a vacant yoga centre on the top-floor into hotel accommodation has also been lodged.
Mr Hameed Latifi wants to convert the top-floor of Crown House on 193 Cowley Road into eight hotel rooms, which would add to the existing hotel on the second floor.
The top-floor stopped being a yoga facility in January 2025.
The design and access statement says: 'The existing use as a hotel has been very successful and experience has shown that there is a need for further hotel accommodation in this part of Oxford City.
'Of course as an extended hotel, further services and will bring further tourists into the area thereby supporting restaurants and cafes, pubs and local shops all of which help to support the local economy.'
(Image: Google Street View) Plans to turn a two-storey semi-detached home in Cowley into a House of Multiple Occupation (HMO) were also lodged.
Mr Abdul Ghaffar wants to convert the home on 27 The Grates into a seven person HMO.
Another application was submitted by Mr Mario Bucaj to add a two-storey extension to a semi-detached house on 119 Fern Hill Road, which would form a separate two-bedroom home.
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The design and access statement says: 'It would produce a high-quality and well-designed scheme that would sit as a complementary addition to the host dwelling and fit comfortably in the Fern Hill Road street scene.
'This section of Fern Hill Road is typified by its mix of property forms, with both semis and small terraced runs and the proposal would conform with the pattern and type and layout of this mix of housing.
'It would come to sit unobtrusively within this established context and fit readily with the character and appearance of the locality and would do so in an entirely complementary and discrete fashion.'
