Legal bid to buy Civil Service Sports Ground moves closer (From Daily Echo)

Legal bid to buy Civil Service Sports Ground moves closer

7:20am Monday 15th March 2010 in Southampton By Matt Smith, Politics and business reporter

The Civil Service Sports Ground next to St Mark's School

THE battle between Southampton City Council and a housing developer over the Civil Service Sports Ground is set to heat up this week.

Council chiefs are set to change the site under planning rules from private open space to school playing fields.

The move will allow the council to use compulsory purchase powers to buy the field after years of talks have failed to persuade builder Bovis Homes to sell.

Bovis bought the eight-acre site in 2005 from the Civil Service Sports Council for an undisclosed sum More than 1,000 people signed a petition to save the land from developers.

The council says there is a shortage of playing fields at schools such as St Mark’s where pupil numbers are rising.

Its planning application shows the field would be marked out with pitches for football, rounders, hockey and athletics and would be available for community use.

A spokesman for Bovis, which lets St Mark’s pupils use part of the site for PE lessons, said; “Negotiations with City Council officers have to date failed to reach an agreement regarding this land.

“We are aware the next course of action planned by the council is to use a compulsory purchase order to acquire it.”