A planning application for 31 low carbon homes in Oxford has been submitted.

OX Place, Oxford City Council’s housing company, plans to build affordable housing on Bertie Place recreation ground, which has been earmarked as a site for housing development since 2013.

This has previously resulted in campaigners calling for homes not to be built on the park with schoolchildren among those protesting at Bertie Park in 2021.

The application outlines plans for 22 of these to be let out as council homes and nine will be sold for shared ownership.

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The council homes will include 10 three-bed houses, 10 one-bed flats and a couple of two-bed flats.

The shared ownership homes will also be two-bed houses.

If planning permission is granted then work could start on the new homes in late 2023.

City councillor and cabinet member for planning and housing, Alex Hollingsworth, said: ”OX Place is building homes for a sustainable future.

“Every single affordable home our housing company builds makes a life changing difference.”

Oxford Mail: Children protest against plans for new homes for Bertie Park in 2021 Children protest against plans for new homes for Bertie Park in 2021

The site’s existing recreation equipment will be replaced by a new public play area and multi-use games area.

A nature trail will be created in the adjacent Cold Harbour site and a new accessible bridge will be built to link the area to Bertie Place.

Managing director of OX Place, Helen Horne, said the new homes were “badly needed” and hopes that work can start later this year.

She said: “We’ve worked extensively with local residents to help shape our plans for Bertie Place and I’m really pleased we’ve now applied for planning permission to build 31 affordable, low carbon homes.”

The new homes can be described as sustainable, as they will be electrically heated, primarily by air source heat pumps, and this means they will become zero carbon when the electricity grid decarbonises.

During the day, solar PV panels will generate electricity and the houses will be equipped with mechanical ventilation heat recovery and this reuses heat that would otherwise be lost from air extracted during ventilation.

There will be five parking spaces with charging facilities for electric vehicles, including one car club and one Blue Badge space.

The remaining three car parking spaces will be for visitors.

In Oxford, average housing prices are more than 12 times average household earnings and this is compared to housing prices being eight times average earnings for England as a whole.

The development will mean the city council is on track to achieve an average 68 per cent beyond government carbon reduction targets.

The planning application is currently being validated and it will be considered in due course.