AN OXFORD bowls club dating back to 1919 may soon be bulldozed.

The building that was the home of the East Oxford club was reduced to a burnt-out wreckage in a fire on May 4 this year.

Now the owners, Oriel College, are seeking conservation area consent to have the remains of the building knocked down - while the long-term future of the site remains up in the air.

Redevelopment for housing on the site between Bartlemas Road and Cowley Road has not been ruled out.

College treasurer Will Stephenson said: "Since the fire we have been trying to secure the necessary consents to have the building demolished.

"We have made the site as safe as we practicably could and it has been delayed just because it is in the conservation area so we have to get conservation area planning consent to have the building demolished."

He added: "The building has been condemned. We had no immediate plans to knock it down otherwise we would have done it already, but I think in the long term it was the most likely outcome."

The club was formed at a meeting in East Oxford Conservative Club on St Valentine's Day in 1919 and in its heyday hoisted many competitions.

After the bowls club folded in January 2001, Oriel College started work converting the site into tennis courts.

But Mr Stephenson said there was not the demand, with other courts in Iffley Road already under-used, and the grass tennis courts were never really used.

He said: "It was not practicable or economic to keep those maintained."

The Bartlemas Conservation Area, in which the club is situated, is currently under review with a report due to go to Oxford City Council's east area parliament within the next few months.

Mr Stephenson said that until the review was complete it would not be possible to make long-term plans for the site.

He said: "A management plan has to be agreed and that will then give us a framework for what the possible uses for that site are.

"We have no current plans, it just depends on what the appraisal finally determines.

"The conservation team have some ideas in terms of how the whole area might be in the longer term, for example opening up visitors from the road to the chapel and things like that."

He added: "Until it is sorted out it is very hard for us to justify any expenditure on working up any particular scheme for the site.

"It is fair to say that for the site of the pavilion itself there must be a possibility of some sort of housing but we will wait and see."

Larry Eltringham, who used to help run the East Oxford Bowls Club, said: "The site has just gone to rack and ruin. Absolutely nothing has been done since we left.

"It's terrible to see. We used to look after the green, so to watch it go like it has, and the veranda to collapse and the weeds to grow, some to eight to ten feet tall, is very disheartening."