HEALTH chiefs say they are ready to substantially redraw plans for a major health centre on the Radcliffe Infirmary site in a bid to save the scheme.

Oxford City Primary Care Trust says it is ready to "substantially reduce" the proposed 165 car parking spaces to allay fears about traffic. And it will compromise on housing numbers and other aspects of a scheme, which it insists is crucial to health care in Oxford. But it may not be enough, as it emerged that Oxford University does not want to share the massive Radcliffe Infirmary site with a health centre.

With city planners recommending that proposals for a super surgery are rejected, the chief executive of Oxford PCT, Andrea Young, said patients in the city could pay a heavy price.

She warned that that existing city GP surgeries in listed buildings were unfit to meet future medical needs and would struggle to comply with new disability discrimination legislation.

And Ms Young fears many patients in the city centre could end up being forced to travel for treatment to Headington, increasingly congested because of the health services there.

The Trust says the newly-adopted Local Plan, while earmarking land for housing and student accommodation, makes no provision for any health care in the city centre.

The proposed four-storey development would incorporate six GP surgeries, including two from Beaumont Street, three from Jericho and North Oxford medical centre on the Woodstock Road. Additional services would include podiatry, physiotherapy, sexual health, family planning, minor surgery facilities, a community pharmacy and diagnostic testing such as X-ray and ultrasound scanning.

Ms Young said: "We are disappointed that councillors at two recent city council area committees have not supported our outline plans for a new health centre. This plan has been based on 12 months' work with planning officers. We are prepared to discuss any element of this scheme because we believe it is right for the people of Oxford. It would put health care in Oxford city at the forefront of the evolving NHS plan to deliver more health care outside hospitals. There is nothing in the Local Plan that would enable us to develop this scheme anywhere else. The thought of an extra 70,000 outpatients having to go to Headington is difficult to imagine."

But it has now emerged that Oxford University, which will occupy eight-tenths of the giant Radcliffe Infirmary site, is opposing the plan. As part of the deal to buy the Radcliffe Infirmary site, the University was obliged to offer 2.8 acres of the site to Oxford City PCT. Yet the University has made clear it has no wish to have a supersurgery as its new neighbour when the Radcliffe Infirmary closes in 2007.

A spokesman for Oxford University said: "The University has made its objections to the planning application known to the city council. The Local Plan clearly states that this area should be designated for educational use, and we believe that it is important that its future use remains in line with this aim."

The Trust chief executive said: "This will be a huge development for the university, but all these academics, students and staff like other people in an expanding city centre will still require good health care." She said the Trust intended to continue working with the council and bus companies to improve pedestrian and public transport access to the scheme.

Meanwhile, Sushila Dhall, Green city councillor for Carfax, who strongly opposes the scheme, said she was prevented from voicing her concerns at a meeting of the council's central, south and west area committee on Wednesday.

A spokesman for the city council said all members were advised to be mindful that comments made by them on plans, might lead to a perception that they did not have an open mind.