Ministry of Defence exodus goes on with Foxhill and Warminster Road about to close
The Ministry of Defence is continuing its exit from Bath with the closure of two sites expected by the end of the month.
The Government department has confirmed that its sites in Warminster Road and Foxhill will be vacated by the end of March. The Ensleigh site is not expected to be fully empty until 2018.
-
The MoD site at Foxhill
The MoD announced its departure from Bath back in 2011, with its 2,600 city-based staff moving to Abbey Wood in Bristol. At the time the Government said the move would save the MoD £40 million.
An MoD spokesman said: “Both Warminster Road and Foxhill are in the final stages of being vacated and this is expected to be completed by the end of March. Ensleigh will be vacated in three stages; the first part has been vacated, the second part will be vacated by December 2013 and the last part is expected to be vacated in 2018. Preferred bidders have been selected for each site and negotiations are ongoing.”
Business Cards From Only £10.95 Delivered www.myprint-247.co.uk
View detailsOur heavyweight cards have FREE UV silk coating, FREE next day delivery & VAT included. Choose from 1000's of pre-designed templates or upload your own artwork. Orders dispatched within 24hrs.
Terms: Visit our site for more products: Business Cards, Compliment Slips, Letterheads, Leaflets, Postcards, Posters & much more. All items are free next day delivery. www.myprint-247.co.uk
Contact: 01858 468192
Valid until: Sunday, May 26 2013
Bath and North East Somerset Council hopes to use the sites to help meet its housing targets. In concept statements produced for the three sites the authority wants to accommodate around 1,300 new homes across the sites, as well as new schools, and community facilities.
Developer Skanska Residential has already bought a small part of the Ensleigh site at Lansdown and revealed plans to build 45 homes.
At Foxhill the council has said it wants to see up to 700 homes and 2,000 square metres of employment space, as well as a new primary school, a health care centre, open spaces and new bus services.
People in Foxhill are now being invited to share their views on how they want to see the area developed.
Foxhill Futures, a community-based group, is hoping to galvanise the views of residents to help create a regeneration plan for the area, which can be used in conjunction with the redevelopment of the MoD site.
The group is holding its second public meeting this Saturday at the Community Centre in Hawthorn Grove between 3pm and 5pm.
Local groups, planners, councillors and representatives from Curo will provide information and opportunities for people to ask questions.
Foxhill Futures project manager, Nigel Dann, said: “This is a critical moment for Foxhill, building a strong voice for all the community is a critical next step: whichever developer gets the site needs to engage with the whole community. Equally, the community needs to develop a clear vision and commitment to ensure that its needs are effectively met by the redevelopment.”
8 Comments
by MoeXXX
Tuesday, March 12 2013, 11:26PM
“@Mr Nemo, I was amongst those moved from Foxhill to Abbey Wood in 1997 (IIRC) in a move intended to save millions of pounds by colocating the whole procurement arm in Bristol and closing the satellite sites (such as Foxhill). Then more millions of pounds were saved by moving the support arm from smaller satellite sites to Foxhill. More recently, they saved even more millions of pounds by moving some of the support services from Foxhill to Abbey Wood, and opening a new site in Copenacre.
If they were to keep all the sites open, I calculate that we could reduce the cost of national defence to zero just by moving everyone back and forth every three weeks.”
by MoeXXX
Tuesday, March 12 2013, 11:26PM
“@Mr Nemo, I was amongst those moved from Foxhill to Abbey Wood in 1997 (IIRC) in a move intended to save millions of pounds by colocating the whole procurement arm in Bristol and closing the satellite sites (such as Foxhill). Then more millions of pounds were saved by moving the support arm from smaller satellite sites to Foxhill. More recently, they saved even more millions of pounds by moving some of the support services from Foxhill to Abbey Wood, and opening a new site in Copenacre.
If they were to keep all the sites open, I calculate that we could reduce the cost of national defence to zero just by moving everyone back and forth every three weeks.”
by Mr_Nemo
Tuesday, March 12 2013, 9:41PM
“I remember speaking to a MoD employee last Nov, who told me that they had been been at Foxhill that day as it was the 'last day' when everyone had left. I suspect that since then it has just been on maintenance and run-down, hence being normally all closed-up.
By contrast, I was told last month that more people were being transferred IN to Ensleigh from outside of Bath! But I think that it is just a case of using some available space while they go thru' yet another interminable reorganisation.”
by Chappers
Tuesday, March 12 2013, 8:19PM
“Hope it's better than Riverside! Won't comment publicly, yet, but far from impressed - Will Crest ever fix my door/ window properly???!!! Dave is spot on, where are the jobs, will it be more weekend retreats/ buy to let?”
by capndave
Tuesday, March 12 2013, 7:07PM
“And all these new people in all these new dwellings will work in all these new jobs which will be created in these new… um! um! um!”
by jezer
Tuesday, March 12 2013, 6:53PM
“So what do local people want exactly? The area appears to be mainly social housing, so I assume the site will be developed as such.”
by SuziQ
Tuesday, March 12 2013, 6:40PM
“Even after all the meetings and discussing with the locals it will not turn out how people want it to.Developers are already chosen more like,that's the way this country works!!!!!”
by jezer
Tuesday, March 12 2013, 4:46PM
“I walked up Perrymead yesterday, past the edge of the Foxhill site, and it appeared to be boarded up and abandoned. There seemed to be some maintenance going on with contractors' vans parked, but nothing else in evidence. It looks to be a huge site suitable for housing development, as I assume is Warminster Road and eventually Ensleigh.”