Plans for 53-bed officers' block at RAF Odiham (From Basingstoke Gazette)
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Plans for 53-bed officers' block at RAF Odiham
1:10pm Saturday 1st September 2012 in Local By Chris Gregory
A MAJOR plan to build accommodation for officers at RAF Odiham has been put forward.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) wants to build a 53-bed block near the current officers’ mess to stop reliance on off-base housing and to house new officers associated with the base’s planned 12 new Mk6 Chinooks.
The plan, submitted to Hart District Council , also includes details of another scheme to extend the base’s perimeter fence so that it includes the current officers’ mess building in Churchill Avenue.
As previously revealed in The Gazette , senior officers at RAF Odiham planned to improve the base’s infrastructure after the cost-cutting plan Project Belvedere, which could have seen the closure of the base, was cancelled in 2008.
The planning application for the 53-bed block read: “As its future was uncertain, there had been no significant investment in and development of RAF Odiham and its facilities since the mid-1990s.
“Now that its long-term prospects are secure, a major Estates Development Framework has been enacted; one of the five key objectives of this stage being the provision of additional Single Living Accommodation for Officers.”
The two-storey block would contain 44 bedrooms for junior officers, of ranks up to Flight Lieutenant, and nine larger suites for senior officers, of ranks of Squadron Leader or above.
The application added that the block will help replace single living quarters outside of the base, such as accommodation at Church Crookham, which the application states is expensive and creates “operational difficulties” due to journeys to work.
A garage block and small stores building will be demolished to make way for the accommodation.
The construction is part of Project SLAM – an MoD-backed scheme to improve single-living accommodation in the Army, Royal Navy and Royal Air Force.
By the end of last year, more than 15,000 bed-spaces had been created at UK bases as part of the project.
