Old St. James Church School site

Media Release

27^th June 2011

 The St. James Residents’ Association has lodged an objection to the planning application N/2011/0504 which plans to redevelop the Old St. James Church School site.

We feel that the plan to demolish the existing school buildings is wholly unecessary and is tantamount to cultural vandalism. They have existed for over one hundred  years and and are as much part of St. James as the name itself.

They are part of the very fabric of this area and have played a big part in many peoples’ lives for many, many years. These buildings are essential to the history and culture of this area and must remain.

The School buildings enjoy curtilage listing from St. James Church which is grade 2 listed and they should remain so, as they are by definition part of the Church. The School was founded by the Church in 1866. Church Schools such as this one in St. James are becoming increasingly rare these days, particularly in towns and cities, and this is one of the last of its kind in Northampton of this age. We have a duty to preserve our heritage for future generations and we have a great opportunity to do that here. St. James would be best served by conservation and conversion in this instance, not demolition and destruction. Many examples of sympathetic conversion of former schools already exist.

It is disingenous in the extreme for the developer to claim in their Design and Access Statement (DAS) that they can find no evidence of a physical or social link between the School and the Church and therefore proclaim that the building should not have listed status. On the contrary, the links are blindingly obvious: many a Jimmy’s Ender will tell you how they walked from the small playground immediately adjacent to the Church, for hymns and prayer. Indeed, the clue should also be in the former ownership of the School site; the Diocese of Peterborough. Further, the name of the school was formerly St. James Church of England School.

In addition, the Northampton Rugby Football Club (Saints) has its origins in the walls of the Church and School since it was founded out of a Boys Improvement Class there by the Reverend Samuel Wigg.

Far too many historic buildings in Northampton and in St. James have been demolished in the name of so called progress, but the replacements enforced upon our communities do nothing to inform our children or visitors to the area of our history and heritage. Buildings such as these put flesh on the bones of a name such as St. James as they have been there for as long as the area itself, and provided education to the children of thousands of shoe industry, railway, tram and bus workers over the years.

We note the council has recently approved the creation of a Shoe Conservation Area in Northampton to protect the many important shoe industry related buildings in the Mounts area (on which we commented about the rich history of shoe making in ST. James and related buildings like schools etc, to which were ignored by the council).  Parts of St. James and in particular the School should be accorded the same status as those currently being given protection elsewhere and we urge the council to protect these buildings as they do have listed status, albeit curtilage. This should be enough on its own to refuse this application.

Instead we suggest the redundant buildings be converted into residential properties or small niche business units or work/live units. The larger of the two playgrounds would provide ample parking for this type of development.

Whilst we are anxious to see something happen to the school site because of persistant vandalism, etc., we still feel it should be a quality development that protects the existing buildings.

We note that the plan wants to keep the hall that fronts on to St. James Road as a sensitive token to the history and streetscene of the site. However we feel that the buildings behind, in particular the old Head Masters Office, and buildings on Greenwood Road, are equally important to the streetscene and fabric of the area.

The developer refers to pre-application consultation activity with the community. To our knowledge no consultation has taken place with the community, at no stage has this association been contacted for our views or the views of our residents on this proposal.

There is also an environmental aspect to this as well, countless heavy lorries carting away the old buidlings just so more lorries can bring in the replacement materials to build 14 houses that may resemble the old one! It doesn’t make sense.

This Association is also extremely concerned that this application, along with two other significant proposals in the area, are to be dealt with under delegated powers, meaning (with all due respect to the proffessionalism of the planning officer) a single, unelected, unaccountable planning officer will decide on the application instead of a planning committee. Potentially, another important part of not just St. James’s, but Northampton’s heritage could be demolished under the decision of just one person. We find this unnacceptable and have voiced our concerns to local Councillor, Terry Wire.

We want to see high quality developments in St. James that benefit local people not just the developer.

We are urging people to view the plans and support us by objecting to the application.

This item is just one of the items that will be discussed at the Residents Meeting on Thursday 30^th June at 7.pm at the Doddridge Centre.