An £11.5m scheme to create a purpose-built Jericho health centre on the site of the former Radcliffe Infirmary hospital has been unveiled.

Oxford University is to fund the major new healthcare facility, which will allow three cramped Oxford GP practices to be resited in modern premises.

The new ‘super surgery’ will form the third phase of the scheme to create a new university campus.

The university agreed to build a Jericho health centre facing on to Walton Street when it bought the Radcliffe Infirmary site from the NHS in 2003.

Three surgeries and up to 12 GPs will move into the ground floor of the new building.

The surgeries — Dr Bogdanor and Partners, Dr Chivers and Partners and Dr Kearley and Partners — are all based in the existing Jericho Health Centre in Walton Street.

In their new premises, the surgeries will be supported by additional health services including training, education, visiting consultant services and approved complementary health services.

Nursing services will be accommodated on the ground floor.

The two floors above the health centre will accommodate the university’s Department of Public Health Care, relocated from the Rosemary Rue Building in the Old Road Campus, along with new Oxford University Press offices.

Oxford University said that the new flat-roofed health centre would be “spacious, modern and easy to reach” and would form a link between Walton Street and the university buildings in the new £200m city quarter.

The new building, leased to the primary health trust, will be situated opposite the entrances to Cardigan Street and Jericho Street.

Pedestrians will be able to access the health centre and the rest of the Radcliffe Observatory Quarter site, from Walton Street. A planning application for the new health centre will be submitted shortly.

Building work is expected to be completed around Easter 2012.

Dr Andy Chivers said: “We are delighted that the new building is going ahead.

“It has been a long process to get to this point. The great thing for us will be to have space to provide proper healthcare in modern surroundings. We hope to be able to expand the range of services we provide, such as physiotherapy.”

When the Radcliffe Infirmary was sold, Jericho and North Oxford residents had hoped that some hospital services would be retained at a health facility on the site.

But Dr Chivers said providing X-ray and ultrasound facilities had not been possible.

He said: “The main thing is that the new building will solve the awful overcrowding that we presently have.

“There will be opportunities for training. I am particularly pleased that our nurses will have more accommodation.

“Our nurses presently have to share a single room.”

Jenny Mann, secretary of the Jericho Community Association, said: “The existing facilities are incredibly cramped and old fashioned. There are about 12 doctors working from there.

“The waiting rooms are overcrowded and it is not at all nice for patients. We are pleased that the doctors are moving into better premises.

“But we originally thought the doctors would be getting some of the medical facilities that were on the Radcliffe Infirmary site, so people would not have to be sent to the John Radcliffe Hospital.”