Tilehurst residents have endured a long saga on the project to rebuild Park Lane School on the site of the current Laurels Infants School, Tilehurst Library and the Health Clinic. Essentially the plan involves building a new school on a single site (replacing the four different sites currently used by the school) with outdoor play areas and selling off the existing playing field in Downing Road, the curent main school building and the annexe in Downing Road. The plan was put together in repsonse to the last two OFSTED reports on Park Lane School which pointed to the limitations of using the current four sites and the unsuitability of the old buildings for modern teaching methods. The sale of the land would finance a large part of the new build. The plan has already been out to consultation in 2008 and last year a further consultation was held prior to seeking agrement to sell off the playing field (legislation requires that permission is granted by the Minister for Children, Schools and Families before any playing fields are disposed of).

The minister has now given consent for the playing field to be sold in order to finance the building of the new school. This is excellent news for Park Lane School and the children of Tilehurst.

However, in the current climate the value of land is considerably down on estimates from two years ago and government is far less likely to  fund any rebuilding as it deals with the current economic crisis. The upshot is that the school now has permission to sell off the playing field but will have to wait some time (probably several years) before finance can be found for the rebuilding. This is not good news for Tilehurst as the saga will continue for some time to come and the council also has to decide whether to finance some serious repairs to the school buildings that are becoming more urgent by the day.