A major milestone has been reached with City of Wolverhampton Council planning committee today (Tuesday) granting outline planning approval for construction of a new health & wellbeing facility and neighbouring homes in Oxley.

The modern health & wellbeing facility and new homes will sit on the site of the former Oxley Day Training Centre.

A feasibility study for the scheme on the vacant, Council-owned Probert Road site was conducted and feedback from stakeholders and the public at community events last year has shaped the design, which consists of two complementary buildings, submitted to planners by the Council.

The residential accommodation proposal will include an opportunity for key worker housing and affordable living. It allows for a mix of 23 housing units across the site with a view to partnering with a housing partner that can support the new Government Self & Custom Build initiative.

A contractor has been appointed to begin full demolition works of the former training centre by late spring 2023.

Councillor Bhupinder Gakhal, City of Wolverhampton Council Cabinet Member for City Assets and Housing, said: “This exciting scheme will bring back to life a brownfield site that is no longer in use and will deliver an important community asset.

“Following our successful community events and the engagement workshop with stakeholders, we gained very useful feedback from a cross section of the community.

“The feedback received was instrumental in shaping the design of the Oxley project as it helped identify further opportunities to benefit the community - and we have now reached the major milestone of achieving outline planning permission.

“This new facility will provide invaluable health & wellbeing services for the local community and will also help deliver more and better homes in Oxley.” 

The Council has been working closely with the NHS Black Country Integrated Care Board (formerly the NHS Black Country and West Birmingham Clinical Comissioning Group), Oxley Stafford and Probert Road GP surgeries, the Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust, Black Country Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust and RWT Primary Care Network to develop a clinical service model. This will provide improved Council health and family services with integrated general medical services, more integrated working between primary care, community services, social care and care providers, accommodation for local GP practices, a base for community nursing teams, a clinical bookable suite to support local delivery of ‘out of hospital’ services, and community space.

Image caption (L-R): A computer generated image of what the new Oxley health & wellbeing facility (pictured right) and homes (pictured left) could look like