PLANNING chiefs have been advised to give the go-ahead today to a proposed expansion of Ilkley Grammar School's Cowpasture Road site.

Bradford Council planners have recommended that Keighley Area Planning Panel grants permission for the new buildings - designed to accommodate almost 1,500 pupils aged 11 to 18 - despite opposition from Ilkley Parish Council, Ilkley Civic Society and local residents.

At present the school is divided between Cowpasture Road and the former middle school on Valley Drive. But under agreements governing the Bradford schools reorganisation, the school will have to be run on a single site.

When the proposal was first put forward, parish councillors said the three-storey teaching block would be over-dominant, that the development would create traffic problems and that they preferred the current split-site arrangement.

On Monday they met again to scrutinise an amended version of the plan - but agreed that the changes which had been made were not good enough.

Audrey Brand, chairman of the parish council's planning committee, said: "Ilkley Parish Council recommends refusal to the plan in its present form. There's some improvement in the design but it's still over-development of the site. It's still too big for the site remembering that that's a conservation area and thinking about houses surrounding it. It's going to stand out like a sore finger when it's there."

She said the council had other concerns about the plan, including:

l Lack of open space for pupils

l Inadequate car parking

l Increased traffic in areas where there is already congestion i.e. Cowpasture Road, Springs Lane and Wheatley Road

l Inadequate bus lay-by

l Insufficient access for emergency vehicles i.e. ambulances, fire engines

Coun Brand said her committee would much prefer pupils to continue attending the middle school site.

"A purpose-built school is provided there on a level site with good access. The first two years are already using that successfully," she said.

She said if the plan - which has prompted 30 letters of objection - was approved, she hoped sixth form students would be dissuaded from taking their cars to school.

Ilkley district councillor Anne Hawkesworth (Con), who initially objected to the plan, said the amended version was a 'great improvement'. "We are moving forward. But I still have concerns about the highways issues and the car parking," she added.