PLANS have been submitted for hundreds of student homes on the site of the Territorial Army Centre at the Slade.

The property arm of the Ministry of Defence is hoping that the multi-million pound development will be able to fund a new TA facility in Abingdon.

Defence Estates is applying to demolish the Slade barracks, which has been home to the TA since the 1950s. It would make way for a major new student complex consisting of 276 student study rooms, 32 flats and 21 houses.

The site in Mascall Avenue is owned by Oxford City Council but the MoD still has 20 years remaining on its long lease. The Ministry makes clear that its intention is to sell on the site if planning approval is secured.

The outline application says: "It is proposed to build a new TA Centre within Oxfordshire, provided that this site can be sold to generate funds to build a new facility.

"Assuming that outline consent is obtained by the autumn, the site could be sold shortly after that, with detailed plans following in the autumn. Development could start as early as next year perhaps in phases, and be complete during the following two years."

Murray Hancock, planning officer for Oxford City Council, said: "It is not a site that we anticipated coming forward now. But we understand that the MoD wants to consolidate its facilities at Dalton Barracks in Abingdon and no longer require it."

It is understood there would be 12 car parking spaces for the students and 82 for the residential accommodation.

The site would also give an unexpected boost to the provision of new affordable housing. The buildings would be kept to a three-storey maximum for flats and two storeys for the houses.

Blackstock Avenue would be developed as the key access to the site, in order to remove the need for a junction directly opposite the fire station.

The site, close to the Oxford Ring Road, lies within New Headington. And it looks certain to further fuel local anger about Headington becoming swamped with students.

Tony Joyce, chairman of the co-ordinating committee of Headington Residents' Associations, said: "We can assume that most of the students at the Slade would be going to Oxford Brookes University.

"This does raise the issue of all these students having to travel through Headington to get there.

"But for the city council this does represent a real brownfield site windfall. We must now ask whether the huge amount of building proposed on the greenfield Warneford Meadows site is still justified."

A planning application to develop the Warneford Meadow and Park Hospital sites could create accommodation for more than 2,000 students.

Mr Joyce said the size of the Slade site meant at least that students would not have "to be squeezed in" as they were on other sites in Headington.

Earlier this month, Headington residents expressed anger at an application to demolish Dorset House, a large Victorian property in Headington, to create accommodation blocks for 363 students.