Oxford City Council

A city-wide partnership in Oxford, is expanding to cover Oxfordshire - highlighting the growing ambition collaboration across the county to tackle carbon emissions. 🌍💡 The Zero Carbon Oxford Partnership (ZCOP), which was first established in 2021, will be expanding to become the Zero Carbon Oxfordshire Partnership.  The new Zero Carbon Oxfordshire Partnership will consist of over 20 organisations from across Oxfordshire, bringing together a growing network of partners working towards the county becoming net zero as a whole by 2050.  Participating organisations include Oxford City Council, Oxfordshire County Council, Cherwell District Council, West Oxfordshire District Council, as well as Enterprise Oxfordshire (previously Oxfordshire Local Enterprise Partnership), Abingdon and Witney College, and Oxfordshire Greentech. Together these organisations will work together towards the goal to achieve net zero across Oxfordshire by 2050, in addition to their own organisation or local decarbonisation targets. Read more: https://lnkd.in/efaGxmhM

Last month we published a new report looking at the top sources of air pollution in Oxford. The Oxford Source Apportionment report, looks at how different sectors (transport, domestic combustion, point sources, other transport, and other emissions), contribute to air pollution across the city. Councillor Anna Railton, Cabinet Member for Zero Carbon Oxford explains the findings of the report. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/exx6nGGz

Earlier this week, Sir Patrick Vallance, Minister for Science, Research and Innovation and Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor Champion, visited Oxfordshire to discuss how the region’s world-leading innovation, high-growth businesses, and strong partnerships are driving economic success. During a roundtable at the Saïd Business School, leaders from City and County Council, local businesses, and universities explored opportunities for sustainable growth and the infrastructure needed to unlock the area's full potential. Lord Vallance then visited ARC Oxford and met with the councils, and representatives from EIT and the Oxford Science Park. They discussed the join aim of reopening the Cowley Branch Line to passengers, a vital project to improve connectivity, support new jobs, and boost long-term prosperity. Councillor Susan Brown, Leader of Oxford City Council, said: "Oxford has a strong and successful economy, but we must invest in the homes and infrastructure needed to support it. We look forward to working with the Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor to ensure opportunities benefit all our residents, communities, and businesses." You can read more about the visit on our website: https://lnkd.in/eK5ZcGCj

There’s more to Youngs Way, our 10 new council and shared ownership homes in Littlemore, than meets the eye. The development is called Youngs Way and was managed by our housing company OX Place. It includes six semi-detached two-bed houses and four semi-detached three-bed houses, all built to be fully adaptable to meet people’s changing needs throughout their lives. The new homes include: · Brick walls with feature front gables, and front gardens with stone boundary walls to blend in with the character of the nearby Littlemore conservation area. · Timber frame construction. Timber frame construction is faster, has a lower carbon footprint and is less disruptive than traditional builds. · A ‘fabric first’ approach, with enhanced insulation and air tightness standards to reduce energy use and carbon emissions. Living spaces face southwest to maximise sunlight. · Electrical heating, primarily through air source heat pumps with rooftop solar PV panels generating electricity for use during the day. · Youngs Way features bat roosting boxes and hedgehog tunnels, together with bug and bee boxes across the site. · Each home has a cycle store with a green roof, providing secure storage for three bikes. There are nine parking spaces with EV charging. These include three spaces suitable for drivers with disabilities. Five council homes are being let at social rent to households on our housing register. The remaining five homes are shared ownership, sold through OX Place.   

A partnership with the Environment Agency has secured the infrastructure needed to allow 18,000 new homes in and around Oxford, delivering change in the area in line with the Government’s ambition to unlock growth. The EA had previously challenged planning applications for new housing over concerns about sewage treatment capacity which posed a risk to water quality if developments had gone ahead as planned. Following a rigorous process to find a solution to unlock the new homes, the EA, Oxford City Council and Thames Water have now agreed a scheme which can provide the capacity needed at the Sewage Treatment Works to allow for the occupation of development from 2027, in line with local plans. Key outcomes from the partnership: 🔹 unlocks 18,000 new homes whilst ensuring high standards of environmental protection 🔹 a new solution to development follows Government calls to unlock growth 🔹 Environment Agency won't seek a planning condition and we can now determine planning applications with benefit of increased confidence in, and oversight of, waste water treatment scheme. You can read more about the plans here: https://lnkd.in/eF4jvt-S

10 new council and shared ownership homes for Oxford! We have completed our latest development of 10 council and shared ownership homes on a former depot site in Littlemore. The development is called Youngs Way and was managed by our housing company OX Place. It includes six semi-detached two-bed houses and four semi-detached three-bed houses. Five council homes are being let at social rent to households on our housing register, with the remaining five homes are shared ownership. Councillor Linda Smith, Cabinet Member for Housing and Communities, and Councillor Nigel Chapman, Cabinet Member for Citizen Focused Services and Council Companies, explain why building more homes like these is vital for Oxford.

We’ve completed our latest development of 10 council and shared ownership homes on a former depot site in Littlemore. The development was managed by our housing company OX Place and includes six semi-detached two-bed houses and four semi-detached three-bed houses. The new homes are built in brick, with feature front gables. Front gardens with stone boundary walls mean they blend in with the character of the adjacent Littlemore conservation area. Five council homes are being let at social rent to households on the housing register. Social rent levels in Oxford are typically around 40% of the rent a private landlord would charge for the same home. The remaining five homes are shared ownership. This is a flexible option for helping people like first time buyers, key workers and under-40s onto the housing ladder by buying a share of their home and paying rent on the rest. Youngs Way takes a ‘fabric first’ approach, with enhanced insulation and air tightness standards to reduce energy use and carbon emissions. Living spaces face southwest to maximise sunlight. The new homes are electrically heated, primarily by air source heat pumps. Rooftop solar PV panels generate electricity for use during the day. Youngs Way features bat roosting boxes and hedgehog tunnels, together with bug and bee boxes across the site. Each home has a cycle store with a green roof, providing secure storage for three bikes. There are nine parking spaces with EV charging. These include three spaces suitable for drivers with disabilities. Learn more about Youngs Way: https://lnkd.in/g4t4i7Hc

Experience Oxfordshire's annual Visitor Economy Business Survey invites local visitor economy businesses to answer multiple-choice questions relating to last year's business performance and expectations for the current year. Your answers, with the resulting insights, will guide Experience Oxfordshire’s marketing, advocacy and business support activity. Please note that all responses are received in confidence and no statements attributed to individual operators or businesses. No individual responses or contact details will be shared with any other third party.

East Oxford Community Centre build progress! 🏗️✨The scaffolding has come down, and big things are happening behind the hoardings at East Oxford, where we're building a brand new community centre. 🏠 New windows in the extension 💨 Ventilation system nearly complete  🔧 Plastering, plumbing, and electrics all taking shape 🧱 Historic stonework and brick repairs underway 🚜 Groundworks to bring in key services started   East Oxford's new community centre is still on track to open this Autumn. Join Councillor Linda Smith, Cabinet Member for Housing and Communities, for a behind-the-scenes tour. 👀

Have your say on our Local Plan 2042! We are inviting residents, businesses and other organisations to share their views by taking a survey on key development issues as we prepare our new Local Plan. The Local Plan 2042 will guide all planning decisions in Oxford for the next 17 years. It will set out how and where housing can be built, support fair economic growth and protect the city’s unique heritage, culture and environment. As part of our preparation, we are reviewing all consultation material, background studies and evidence underpinning its work to date. The purpose of this early engagement is to ensure we draft policies in step with views on the following key issues: 🔹 prioritising the delivery of homes, especially social housing and key worker housing 🔹 allowing homes to be built on land now used for employment, like offices and business areas 🔹 addressing climate change and flood risk, protecting new buildings from their impact 🔹 requiring low-carbon and environmentally friendly buildings with standards going beyond national requirements 🔹 prioritising the preservation of Oxford’s heritage, its cultural events and community and entertainment venues 🔹 promoting good design of new buildings We will hold two rounds of statutory public consultation later this year as we finalise the plan before examination by the Planning Inspectorate in 2026. The early engagement survey is open for six weeks on our consultation website: https://lnkd.in/gje93Tfn