THE future of threatened downland on the edge of Winchester could be secured if the city council allows a “knowledge park” to be built on a redundant Army base.

The city council and landowner, the Church Commissioners, have discussed guaranteeing public access to Bushfield Down as a benefit from a development on the former barracks.

A full meeting of council recently agreed to support the idea of a knowledge park in its planning development framework, which will guide development over the next 20 years.

The Church Commissioners has offered to give up most of the site should it be allowed to develop the camp. The land, potentially flower-rich chalk grassland between Badger Farm Road, the railway line and Whiteshute Ridge, would be maintained for ever as public open space.

Council leader, George Beckett, said Bushfield Camp was not defensible in the medium or long term. He said: “Our planning policy will be defeated with regard to Bushfield, a brownfield site, at some point in the next five, ten or 20 years. It will succumb to pressure ultimately.

“We have the opportunity for a scheme which also has a huge public benefit. The Bushfield land may not be available again. We have to secure what we can now.”

He said the Church Commissioners had recognised the knowledge park would be less controversial if the land went into public ownership.

Cllr Beckett added that he and officers had met the agents to discuss the future of Bushfield. The commissioners have been trying to develop the land for at least 30 years, previously suggesting housing and superstores.

Cllr Beckett said there was nothing sinister in the proposal: “The commissioners have been interested in the LDF from the off. They asked what we might or might not find acceptable there. Officers said developing the whole site would not be supported. At the same time, our evidence shows the allocation of some site for the economic expansion was desirable.”

He said he was providing leadership and a clear vision of Winchester’s future.

“Somebody has to put these ideas forward. There is a view Winchester should be preserved in aspic and mustn’t change. But the city needs to look to future changes in the economy.”

A knowledge park would make the city less dependent on rich commuters and public service jobs such as the county council, prison and hospital, he said. The City of Winchester Trust greeted with disappointment the Bushfield decision at full council on April 22.

Vice-chairman, Michael Carden, said: “We are adamantly opposed to it (a knowledge park). It will be very visible to the setting of Winchester. It is just possible it could work if it was fine architecture and well-screened by trees. There is a real danger it could end up as an industrial estate.”

Brian Collin, city councillor for Oliver’s Battery and Badger Farm, said it would not create employment for local people.

“The whole point about the LDF is that it’s supposed to be sustainable and keep the value of jobs in the local economy.

“If you build a knowledge park on the edge of the city, people from Southampton and Portsmouth will take the value of the jobs outside.”

Instead, he suggested putting a knowledge park in a more central location, such as Bar End or the old cattle market in Worthy Lane.

But the chairman of Oliver’s Battery Parish Council said he supported a knowledge park.

Geoff Sharman said: “I’m in favour because it’s a wonderful site and I think it deserves to be developed rather than neglected.

“There’s problems with vandalism and nuisance and I would hate to see it used for housing.

“Public ownership would be a benefit for the whole city. Green spaces that are accessible are the best, farmland which you can’t walk across is not of much benefit.”

A spokesman for the Church Commissioners said: “The commissioners fully support the council’s decision to include Bushfield Camp in the Core Strategy Preferred Options for use as a ‘knowledge park’.

“This proposal would help secure Winchester's long-term prosperity at a time when innovative approaches to the local economy are especially important.

“The commissioners are, though, mindful of environmental as well as economic pressures.

“For the Bushfield site, this can best be achieved by using the previously built-on land for development and offering a considerable area of downland to the council for open space and recreational use.

“This would provide southern Winchester with a very attractive public facility for all to use.”