Work appears to have started on the former ‘circus field’ next to Aldi in north Abingdon, with grass being cleared and roadways beginning to be marked out.
The site has planning permission (P23/V2861/O) from June 2025 for a mixed development including a care home and new homes. I believe, the care home has full planning permission and can be built once the necessary technical details have been approved, while the housing still needs further approval on exactly what will be built and what it will look like.
As the technical approvals for the care home have been approved with further planning applications over the last year, my guess is that this first phase of work will be for roads and the care home at the lower end of the site. The housing will follow once the remaining planning applications have been submitted and approved.
There was also talk of a nursery when the plans were first discussed but I believe that is no longer part of the plans. Let me know if I am wrong.
Imagine the noise and pollution in the gardens of that care home !
But just imagine the profit to be made!
Umpteen years ago, when all this was first mooted, we went to the developer’s meeting. We brought up the fact that the houses were going to be very noisy no matter how much glazing was put in and sitting in the garden would be very unpleasant.
No problem said the developer; the houses closest to the A34 were all designated social housing !
That Care Home consideration was also my immediate thought.
Potential traffic from that housing estate turning right onto Copenhagen Drive (across what can be a busy flow) adds avoidable risk. Would it be more logical to make the access to the new housing direct to/from the existing roundabout ?
If not, pray that some future ‘traffic engineer’ doesn’t just throw down more mini-roundabouts, traffic lights and Pelicans after the problem establishes.
When its busy turn left, then go around the roundabout and come back down the road..
They should have made the entrance to the site from the Aldi car park, rather than adding another dangerous junction
I know that it is widely known as the ‘Circus Field’.
In this house it is, or was, the Lapwing Field.
Yet more pressure on a species already in decline.
I always thought this was the perfect site for a simple access road south onto the A34 but the Liberals didn’t want to know. A glance at a map arguably suggests it would have served many more people than the Lodge Hill extravaganza, and saved two or three Km into the bargain.