TWO CAR parks in Summertown are being earmarked for development, a week after plans were unveiled to build on St Clements car park.

The Oxford City Council-owned car park serving Summertown’s main shopping area is on a list of 100 potential development sites, The Oxford Times can reveal.

The site, one of the largest being lined up for development in North Oxford, would also include Ewert House Hall, a large 1960s Oxford University complex, along with a private university car park.

Oxford City Council confirmed that it had held talks with Oxford University about developing Diamond Place, with the Town Hall standing to make millions from any deal.

Local people will be consulted about the future of the site and other local building proposals at Summertown Comm-unity Centre on November 26.

The council will also be seeking views about developing ‘green’ land off Marston Ferry Road for recreational use.

The Diamond Place car park is viewed as crucial to local shops and businesses, with little alternative car parking in the surrounding residential area.

And news that the site could be developed caused similar anger to that expressed by traders on the Cowley Road, who say plans to build student accommodation blocks on St Clements car park would turn their area into a “ghost town”.

Like St Clements traders, Summertown businesses said they were unaware that their local council-owned car park was already in the Local Plan, where it is identified for “a mixed-use development” with vehicular access via Diamond Place and/or Ferry Pool Road.

The Local Plan, the blueprint for development in the city, says: “the level of public car parking spaces should be retained and integrated into the redevelopment proposal”, suggesting that, as in the St Clements car park, new buildings would have to stand on stilts.

But shops and restaurants in Summertown fear any development would lead to loss of spaces, with the car park closed for up to a year while work was being undertaken.

Domenico Trombino, who has run the La Dolce Vita restaurant for 23 years, said: “We need more parking, not less. We have people coming in here saying that they have driven around Summertown two or three times and can find nowhere to park.”

Adam Evans, manager of papers and paint shop Farrow & Ball, said: “Less car parking would be seriously detrimental to the whole area.

“People already lose business because people say they cannot park.”

Adrian Rhymes, manager of the Shepherd and Woodward schoolwear store, on Banbury Road, said: “The parking restrictions introduced around here mean the only option that people have is to go to the pay and display car park in Diamond Place.”

Ewert House houses several small university departments with a large refurbished hall run by the University of Oxford Delegacy of Local Examinations.

Jean Fooks, city councillor for Summertown, said: “No one has talked to us about it. Local people had no idea. We desperately need to know what is going on. There now needs to be proper consultation to see what would be acceptable on this site. There is constant pressure on parking here.

“We have just heard that sites at Wolvercote’s paper mill and on green land off Marston Ferry Road are also being looked at.”

A city council spokesman moved to ease fears of housebuilding on green land in North Oxford.

She said: “Land off Marston Ferry Road is a site that we will be asking the public about, but in the context of Green Belt compatible uses only — for example, sports use and recreation.”

The city council said no firm decisions had been made about any of the sites on the new list.