Cripley Meadow
{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2018}}
{{Use British English|date=March 2018}}
{{infobox UK place
|official_name= Cripley Meadow
|static_image= Castle Mill from Castle Mill Stream, Port Meadow, Oxford.JPG
|static_image_width= 240px
|coordinates = {{coord|51.760|-1.274|display=inline,title}}
|label_position= left
|os_grid_reference=
|population=
|population_ref=
|civil_parish=
|shire_district= Oxford
|shire_county= Oxfordshire
|region= South East England
|country= England
|post_town= Oxford
|postcode_district= OX2
|postcode_area= OX
|dial_code= 01865
|constituency_westminster= Oxford West and Abingdon
|website= [http://www.cripleymeadow.org.uk/ Cripley Meadow Allotments Association]
|pushpin_map = United Kingdom Oxford
}}
Cripley Meadow lies between the Castle Mill Stream, a backwater of the River Thames, and the Cotswold Line railway to the east, and Fiddler's Island, on the main branch of the Thames to the west, in Oxford, England.{{cite web| url=http://wikimapia.org/12939622/Cripley-Meadow-Allotments | title=Cripley Meadow Allotments (Oxford) | publisher=Wikimapia | accessdate=22 October 2012 }} It is to the south of the better known Port Meadow, a large meadow of common land. To the south is Sheepwash Channel which connects the Oxford Canal with the River Thames.
History
File:Goldwin Smith.jpg, a 19th-century Regius Professor of Modern History at Oxford University, who organized opposition to planned GWR carriage-making workshops at Cripley Meadow.]]
In October 1554, John Wayte (later Mayor of Oxford) was appointed along with two others to travel to London to give instructions concerning Cripley Meadow and Port Meadow.{{cite web| url=http://www.oxfordhistory.org.uk/mayors/1485_1603/wayte_john_1555_1561.html | title=John Wayte: Mayor of Oxford 1555/6 and 1561/2 | publisher= Oxford History | work= Mayors & Lord Mayors |location=UK | accessdate=22 October 2012 }}
In 1865, there was the possibility that the Great Western Railway (GWR) could become a major employer in Oxford since the company's railway carriage-making workshops, that were expected to provide 1,500 jobs, were to be sited in the city, moving from Paddington in London.{{cite web | url=http://www.cripleymeadow.org.uk/history.htm | title=History | publisher=Cripley Meadow Allotments Association | location=UK | accessdate=22 October 2012 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130606230528/http://www.cripleymeadow.org.uk/history.htm | archive-date=6 June 2013 | url-status=dead }}{{cite book| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=J0ceAQAAIAAJ&q=%22Cripley+Meadow%22 | title=Excursions in Hopkins | first1=Norman H. | last1=MacKenzie | first2=Catherine | last2=Phillips | publisher=Saint Joseph's University Press | year=2008 | isbn=978-0916101763 | page=36 }} The City of Oxford corporation, which thirty years earlier had opposed the railway, offered a lease on Cripley Meadow for the workshops. There was great enthusiasm for the initiative.{{cite journal| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nKUwAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA1-PA207 | page=207 | journal=Punch | title=Triumph of the Great Western Railway | volume=48–49 | year=1865 | last1=Lemon | first1=Mark | last2=Mayhew | first2=Henry | last3=Taylor | first3=Tom | last4=Brooks | first4=Shirley | last5=Burnand | first5=Sir Francis Cowley | last6=Seaman | first6=Owen }} However, the University of Oxford opposed the proposal, led by Goldwin Smith, a historian at University College, Oxford whose father had also been a director of GWR.{{cite book| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3bDAWHbXgi4C&pg=PA459 | page=459 | title=The History of the University of Oxford | volume=VI: Nineteenth-Century Oxford | editor1-first=M. G. | editor1-last=Brock | editor-link1 = Michael Brock | editor2-first=M. C. | editor2-last=Curthoys | publisher=Oxford University Press | year=1998 | isbn=978-0199510160 }} A contract for the Cripley Meadow site was already in place, but a change in leadership at GWR meant that the workshops were built at Swindon instead.
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Allotments
Before 1891, it is likely that Cripley Meadow was used for horse grazing, similar to Port Meadow, and also hay production. By March 1891, about 14 acres of the land was let to the North Oxford and Jericho Allotments Association for allotments. Over the following years, the city engineer organized the deposit of street refuse on the site to raise its level above the river.
Cripley Meadow Allotment Association is managed by an annually elected committee. Oxford City Council lease the land to the association and devolve its management to the committee. Since 2004 over 160 plots have been cleared and put back into use. It is now a thriving site supporting over 200 members in growing local food and flowers.
Cripley Island Orchard has also been established.{{cite web | url=https://www.panoramio.com/photo/69009664 | title=Breaking new ground at the Cripley Meadow Allotments | publisher=Panoramio | accessdate=22 October 2012 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151230125121/http://www.panoramio.com/photo/69009664 | archive-date=30 December 2015 | url-status=dead }}
Development
{{main|Castle Mill}}
File:Panorama of graduate housing from Port Meadow, Oxford.jpg graduate housing on what was Cripley Meadow, looking south from Port Meadow across.]]
File:Obscured view of St Barnabas campanile from Port Meadow, Oxford.JPG campanile obscured by new Oxford University graduate accommodation, looking across Cripley Meadow at the southern end of Port Meadow.]]
Since 2012, the Castle Mill site (400 m by 25 m) between the Cripley Meadow Allotments{{cite web | url=http://www.cripleymeadow.org.uk/planningissues.htm | title=Planning issues: Cripley Road/ Roger Dudman Way development of Castle Mill Site | publisher=Cripley Meadow Allotments | location=UK | accessdate=18 April 2013 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130607012244/http://www.cripleymeadow.org.uk/planningissues.htm | archive-date=7 June 2013 | url-status=dead }} and the railway tracks is being developed as extensive student accommodation for the Oxford University Estates Directorate by Longcross.{{cite web | url=http://www.longcross.co.uk/our-projects/current-projects/castle-mill | title=Longcross at the University of Oxford, Castle Mill Phase 2 ∙ Innovation in action | publisher= Longcross] | accessdate=23 October 2012 | url-status=dead | archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20140224021145/http://www.longcross.co.uk/our-projects/current-projects/castle-mill | archivedate=24 February 2014 }} There is a badger run at the site.{{cite web | url=http://www.longcross.co.uk/newsroom/latest/oxford-residential | title=Longcross Secures Student Accommodation Project at Oxford University | date=July 2012 | publisher= Longcross] | accessdate=23 October 2012 | url-status=dead | archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20130310041909/http://www.longcross.co.uk/newsroom/latest/oxford-residential | archivedate=10 March 2013 }}
The development of Castle Mill has been controversial since the four- and five-storey blocks overlook Port Meadow.{{cite news| title=City 'has to pay a price' to preserve Green Belt | newspaper=The Oxford Times | pages=1, 3 | date=1 November 2012 }} Campaigners have warned of damage to views of Oxford.{{cite news| url=http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/news/yourtown/oxford/10022285._Save_our_famous_views_for_hideous_developments_/| title=Save our famous views for hideous developments | first=Reg | last=Little | newspaper=The Oxford Times | date=2 November 2012 | accessdate=4 November 2012 }}{{cite news|url=http://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/10022285._Save_our_famous_views_for_hideous_developments_/| title=Save our famous views for hideous developments | first=Reg | last=Little |newspaper=Oxford Mail | date=2 November 2012 | accessdate=4 November 2012 }} There has been an online petition{{citation| work=www.thepetitionsite.com/850/008/830/port-meadow-oxford-damaged-views/ | title=Port Meadow, Oxford. Damaged views | first=Sushila | last=Dhall | publisher=Care2petitionsite | year=2012}} and concern has been raised by the Oxford Preservation Trust and the Green Party.{{cite news| title=Planning: Controversy over student flats at Roger Rudman Way — The battle of Port Meadow | first=Reg | last=Little | newspaper=The Oxford Times | page=10 | date=1 November 2012 }} Anger has been caused even among members of Oxford University.{{cite news| url=http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/news/opinions/leader/10021476.Tall_storey/ | title=Tall storey | newspaper=The Oxford Times | page=32 |date=1 November 2012 | accessdate=4 November 2012 }} The development has been likened to building a "skyscraper beside Stonehenge".{{cite news| title=Historian takes university to task over 'visual disaster' of Port Meadow flats | first=Reg | last=Little | newspaper=The Oxford Times | page=3 | date=7 February 2013 }} In February 2013, Oxford City Council entered negotiations with Oxford University to reduce the height of the buildings by two storeys.{{cite news| title=U-turn over meadow flats | first=Pete | last=Hughes | newspaper=The Oxford Times | page=3 | date=14 February 2013 }}