Local people in Oxford are invited to see the initial proposals for the building of new homes and state-of-the-art community facilities this Thursday (19 May).

Oxford City Council recently selected GreenSquare (which includes OCHA) to develop the 109 new homes and two new community centres on three sites the Council owns - Westlands Drive and Dora Carr Close in Northway, and Barns Road in Cowley.

GreenSquare is working with its joint venture partner Hab - the development company set up by Kevin McCloud, presenter of the long-running TV series Grand Designs - as Haboakus for this Oxford development project.

Kevin and other members of the Haboakus project team - including architects AHMM - will be on site at Barns Road, opposite the Templars Square shopping centre (and right next door to the OCHA offices), between 2pm and 7pm on Thursday 19 May.

Haboakus is producing newspaper-style leaflets with large aerial photographs of the sites and its architect's initial proposals for each location.

Councillor Bob Price, Leader of Oxford City Council, says: "We are keen for the local residents in these communities to help us in developing and shaping the plans for these very important sites. We are aiming to build some very attractive and well-designed homes that meet our very high environmental standards."

Marita Ford, GreenSquare Development Projects Manager, says: "We will be asking everyone who comes to one of our public consultation events to let us know if they’d like to remain involved as the project moves forward.

"We hope local people will take part in discussion groups about the housing and community centre proposals - or agree to complete surveys by email or post."

A public consultation with residents of the Northway neighbourhood took place last Wednesday.

Most of the new homes are planned to be for low-cost rent or shared ownership, with a proportion for private sale.

The project will also see the relocation of furniture recycling store operated by the charity Emmaus from Westlands Drive to new premises on Barns Road. It is hoped that the period of public consultation will lead to a planning application towards the end of this year, with building works to start in 2012 and completion anticipated by early 2015.