CITY leaders have said plans to scrap park-and-ride facilities in Oxford were put forward without consulting them first.

Oxfordshire County Council on Monday unveiled its £1.2bn transport strategy for the city, covering the next 20 years.

It focuses on a “rapid transit” network of bus routes, servicing the city from a series of park-and-ride locations outside the ring road.

New sites at Eynsham, Cumnor, Lodge Hill, Sandford, Langford Lane in Kidlington and the A34 east of Kidlington have been proposed to replace those at Seacourt, Redbridge and Pear Tree.

But the three earmarked for closure are owned and operated by Oxford City Council, which has rebuffed suggestions they would be close.

Last year the car parks generated about £770,000 for the authority and this year they have been budgeted to make just under £910,000.

City council leader Bob Price said: “They [the county council] have not discussed these plans with us and clearly we are not in favour at this stage.

“It would simply mean transferring the assets of the city to some far-flung location that might not even be accessible for commuters.”

The county plans put forward by the county directly clash with recent announcements by the city that its Pear Tree and Seacourt sites would be expanded.

And city council spokesman Chofamba Sithole confirmed the authority still intended to press ahead. He said: “It will be many years before we see the county’s ideas come to life and in the meantime it is vital that we maintain the park-and-ride system at a scale which reflects increasing demand for the service. We will continue to pursue expansion.

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“At the start of the county’s strategy project we asked to be involved, but in practice that has been limited to being told of the main proposals.

“We have raised concerns about the proposals to close the existing park-and-ride sites in the absence of the data, analysis and a clear, funded plan for implementation of the alternative provision.”

The county’s new strategy aims to catch drivers before they enter city boundaries and encourage them to ride in on buses instead.

County council leader Ian Hudspeth said: “The idea is to move the park-and-rides further back and cut people off from going in to the ring road, to free up the roads in those areas.

"We then have to establish a good rapid service into the city from those outside locations, or people won’t use it.”

The new plan would almost double the overall number of park-and-ride spaces from about 5,000 to 9,400.

The biggest sites would include 1,700 spaces at the Kidlington A34 junction and another 1,600 at the Lodge Hill A34 junction.

Thornhill park-and-ride is pegged to take on more than 450 extra spaces and Water Eaton is to be used predominantly for train passengers using the new Oxford Parkway station.

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