PART of the Oxford bypass should be turned into “an urban boulevard” to ensure thousands of people living in a new housing development do not feel cut off from the rest of the city.

The idea is being put forward by Oxford Civic Society, which maintains Oxford must learn from the mistakes of the past if the new extension of the city goes ahead.

Society members say it is crucial that people living in the 900 homes at the proposed Barton West development should feel part of the city, rather than being isolated from Oxford by speeding traffic on the ring road.

And they believe this can be achieved by simply repeating the layout of Sunderland Avenue in north Oxford, which services as both a desirable residential street and the northern section of the ring road.

Members of the civic society have submitted their idea to Oxford City Council, which last week agreed to seek an investment partner to deliver the major development on council-owned land between Barton and Marston.

The civic society’s new chairman, Peter Thompson, called for the creation of a boulevard in place of “the racetrack,” that the ring road becomes as it sweeps towards the Green Road roundabout.

Mr Thompson said the urban design consultant Graham Smith, had taken the suggestion of an ‘urban boulevard’ a stage further, by superimposing the Sunderland Avenue layout on the proposed development site and the A40.

He said: “Sunderland Avenue provides a really interesting case study.

“Although the traffic flows are heavy, there is none of the sense of the separation of the community, which occurs as soon as one moves east onto Elsfield Way.”

He feared that simply building a pedestrian/cycle bridge over the ring road to connect Barton West with Headington and Northway, the option now being looked at, would fail to link the various communities together properly.

Mr Thompson said the society’s proposal might be advanced by news that Ruskin College is ready to offer green land on the other side of the A40 for the West Barton development.

Last week, the principal of Ruskin College Prof Audrey Mullender said Ruskin Fields, at the bottom of the college’s Old Headington campus, could be a key location to allow links between the new development and Northway, with the possibility of extra housing.

Mr Thompson said: “It seems possible that an integrated design for development both sides of the A40, comprising housing, recreation areas and social and educational facilities, together with routes for pedestrians and cyclists, would not be objectionable.”

Mr Smith, a member of the civic society who formerly taught urban design at Oxford Brookes University, said: “I have always felt that it was outrageous and terrible that Barton is separate from Oxford through being on the other side of the ring road.

“In this country we have treated urban routes through urban areas as more important than the urban areas themselves. Socially uniting West Barton with the rest of the city would be hugely beneficial.

“It would also mean any new facilities in West Barton would be more easily available to a wider range of people.”