Where should a university for Swindon go?

Ideas for Swindon's expansion in 1965. Growth to the west was limited, but went all the way to Tadpole Lane in the north, where it is now. Building in the 'Front Garden' was envisaged, next to then proposed M4. The two university sites are shown outlined in red

The forces for and against the development of a university campus at Coate Water are lined up, each arguing their case forcefully.

The University of Bath wants to build a campus big enough for at least 10,000 students and 2,500 staff between Coate and the Great Western Hospital at Commonhead. Vice chancellor Glynis Breakwell has stated bluntly that Coate is the only site that will be considered so that there can be a cross pollination of scientific and medical research, a so-called 'synergy of interest.' Bath is ranked as the fifth highest performing university in the country and its pharmacy department is thought to be the best in Europe.

Developers Persimmon Homes and Redrow own the land and will give at least 60 hectares in return for permission to build 1,800 houses and businesses. In November, Swindon Council amended its draft Local Plan to 2011 to include Coate as a development site.

However, environmentalists vigorously oppose building at Coate, accusing the council of reneging on promises made to protect the area when permission for the hospital was given in the 1990s. In December's Swindon Link magazine Jean Saunders of Swindon Friends of the Earth wrote of her anger at how the promises made only a few years ago about the protection of Swindon's open spaces are being turned on their head. "When planning permission for the Great Western Hospital was given, we were repeatedly assured that this was a one-off. The building was allowed as an exception to the planning rules. Yet we have known, for years, that developers have been queuing up to build on the remaining land between Commonhead roundabout and Coate. We knew that the hospital would just open the flood-gates."

She argues that Swindon does not need another out of town development and the university should be a central feature of town centre regeneration, close to the Science Research Councils already located at North Star and the new Swindon College, preserving Coate Water as a national nature reserve in a semi-rural setting.

The university has stated that it will do nothing to harm the Coate environment. If the development were to go ahead, the university proposes to establish a smaller town centre campus focussed on the creative arts.

A anti-university web site can be found at www.savecoate.org.uk

To sign the online petition, go to www.petitiononline.com/savecoat/petition.html



Swindon and Bath, an ironic synergy

Sites for a university in Swindon have been identified over many years but the town was only successful when the University of Bath formed a partnership with Swindon Council in 1998. The council put up about £6 million in cash and property to cement the relationship.

In the early 1960s Swindon Corporation submitted proposals to the University Grants Committee to bid for one of the new universities being considered by Central Government.

In 'Swindon: a plan for expansion,' a study published in 1965 which set out development planning principles two sites for a university were identified, a preferred area of 200 acres at Coate Water and an alternative at Stanton Park, near Kingsdown.

In the text of the report 150 acres of surplus railway land at North Star was also identified as an urban site for a university or a new general hospital.

But Swindon had already been by-passed in the race for a new university in the south-west. Building started on the Bath campus in 1964. Thus there is a certain irony that the desire of Swindon for a higher seat of learning is being provided by a city that was its competitor some 40 years ago.