The Building of St Edward's School: A Chronology (1870 - 2020)

P AGE N O : 78 Already it is found difficult to manage with the present accommodation. This includes the three prefabricated huts by Cowell’s which are very much sub-standard’. This unsatisfactory situation can only be resolved with new building. One recommendation to the Governors is to build ‘a new class room Block’. (General Purposes, February 1968) Discussion on-going with Roger Fitzsimmons of Peter Falconer & Partners regarding a new Language Centre Building to contain eight rooms and the possibility of further extensions later on. Plan is to site this new building between the Work Block and Segar’s House (Governors’ Meting, March 1968). The plan is recommended by the General Purposes Committee at their meeting in May 1968 at a cost of £20,000-£30,000 (£492,000 - £738,000 today) with consideration to be given for ten class rooms Planning permission granted for new Language Centre in December (Governors’ Meeting, March 1969) Studies built over Junior Day Room in Macnamara’s ( H.P. Little design ). 1969 - New Language Centre ( R. Fitzsimmons desig ) completed on a site between the Work Block and the Oakthorpe Road at a cost of £30,000 - £35,000 (£470,000-£550,000 today). The Modern Languages and Classics Departments will move to this new building (January Chronicle). 1970 - The Oxford City Road Plan, proposed by the city authorities, ‘impinges drastically upon St. Edward’s’. The North-South relief road would run across the canal fields severing the Kendall Quad from the rest of the School. Due for implementation in 1991, the City is looking for ‘total adoption’ from the Minister of Transport immediately. A Public Enquiry is launched in the summer and the School’s objections will be heard in November (November Chronicle) In the ‘Oxford Times’ it is reported that the proposed £31 million roads and traffic scheme is ‘being ‘callous’ in the treatment of St. Edward’s School’. Warden Bradley is quoted as saying the plan would cause a ‘horrible mutilation’ of the School’s grounds. The School, which had taken 100 years to create, ‘would be damaged irreparably if this plan is allowed to stand’. The Spine Road would destroy 19.5 acres but ‘reluctantly and in the interest of Oxford’ the School would not oppose the Spine Road but would oppose the Spur Road (Oxford Times 1971) Threat of new road plan removed in late 1970 after objections from the School are allowed. ‘It is now quite clear that for the next thirty years at least we are in no danger’ (General Purposes Committee, November 1971) John Armstrong appointed Second Master and housed in 289 Woodstock Road (General Purposes Committee, February 1969)