A NEW boys' school in Bradford will have to be based in a temporary location for up to two years, the academy trust behind it has confirmed.

Eden Boys Leadership Academy is due to open to its first pupils in September, but will first open at a site in Thornbury rather than the planned site on the major Thornton Road route.

Earlier this year, a joint planning application submitted by the Department of Education and Star Academies revealed the former site of Hilmore House - Morrisons old headquarters - would be where the school is based.

The application, now withdrawn, was for two temporary buildings and said a permanent school on the site, a short distance away from the Thornton Road/Ingleby Road junction, is unlikely to be complete until 2021. Hilmore House was demolished in 2006, and the site has been vacant ever since.

The Eden Boys academy will be a Muslim faith school, although the trust’s website says it is “welcoming applications from pupils of all faiths and none".

In response to the application, Bradford Council's Highways Department offered scathing comment: "The temporary school buildings are to be occupied by Eden Boys' Leadership Academy Bradford, a secondary school for boys. The school will provide 120 spaces for Year 7 pupils in its first year of operation (2019/20) and 240 spaces for Year 7 & 8 pupils in its second year (2020/21).

"A future planning application, for the wider site, will accommodate the permanent school, which will ultimately cater for a total of 800 pupils. When viewed in isolation if this temporary school is approved what happens if the larger permanent school is not? "cart before horse" springs to mind!

"Highway development control has already provided advice on the proposal for a permanent 800-pupil school on this site and did not support this due to the highway safety concerns it raises.

"Therefore given that the purpose of this application for a temporary school is merely to prime the site for a much larger permanent school then Highways would not be able to support this application either until such a time as permission is first gained for the larger school."

It also says that Bradford Council's Senior Transport Planner has raised a number of concerns, including that in 2017, Thornton Road had one of the highest numbers of recorded vehicle crashes in the Bradford district.

"The number of car parking spaces proposed for staff/parents/visitors is likely to be insufficient and need to be increased otherwise parking on the adjacent streets will take place to the detriment of safety," it adds.

"The presence of existing KFC fast food outlet will generate massive queues of students to the detriment of road safety.

"The site is disused at present. The side streets are almost full of parked cars belonging to existing users of premises in the area. "

It says measures have not been put forward by the applicant to try and address the concerns raised.

However, a comment from Bradford Council's education department said that since 2010, there has been an increase in Bradford's pupil population and the additional places at the new academy are required to meet demand.

Following the withdrawal of the application, a spokesperson for Star Academies said: “Eden Boys’ Leadership Academy will be opening, as planned, in September 2019.

"Plans are continuing to progress for the development of the permanent school site on Thornton Road. The academy will initially open at a temporary location, where it will be based for up to two years.

"Working alongside the Department for Education, we have identified a vacant building opposite Laisterdyke Leadership Academy on Thornbury Road as the most appropriate site to locate the school on a temporary basis. The building, which has been purpose-built for use as a school, is in a good condition and, over the next few months, we will be carrying out extensive refurbishment works to create specialist teaching spaces in preparation for welcoming our first pupils in September.”