Daniel Scharf ‘Shameful heritage of airbase is being ignored, November 12,’ criticises the failure to develop the former RAF Upper Heyford as a Cold War heritage site of international importance.
Certainly to stand on the runways among the hardened aircraft shelters hugging the ground like huge primeval monsters powerfully evokes a time when there were nuclear-armed aircraft within them, ready to fly towards the Iron Curtain at a moment’s notice. This scene and atmosphere must be preserved.
He describes the site as ‘remote’ and ‘unsustainable’ and it is in these misdescriptions that the tension between using Upper Heyford/Heyford Park to help meeting Cherwell’s housing and employment needs and preserving it as a memorial of the Cold War lies. The site is 10 minutes’ drive from J10 of the M40: attractive to employers who need to be plugged into the national road network. It is five miles from Bicester with its new shopping centre and stations: potentially attractive to residents wanting a rural location, whether they want to work locally, nearby, or commute.
It is difficult to see in what terms Heyford Park is unsustainable. As we have seen, it is accessible. There is employment on the site. And it has plenty of infrastructure, albeit rundown, dating back to the days when it was a piece of the Mid-West in the middle of Oxfordshire.
Today’s letters
Far from being a remote and unsustainable place for development it is an opportunity site which cannot be ignored when Cherwell is under pressure to find sites to meet its housing targets. Given the size of the site there must be space both for development and conservation of its heritage.
Henry Brougham The Moors Kidlington
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