PARKING spaces have been created on Oxford’s Wood Farm estate in the latest bid to improve the area.

Oxford City Council built the 16 spaces at a cost of £135,000 as part of its Great Estates project.

The scheme aims to improve communal areas in the city’s estates and the council now has £450,000 to spend in this financial year.

The latest work – in Chillingworth Crescent – saw verges replaced with paved parking bays and took five weeks.

Scott Seamons, city council board member for housing, said: “Parking in Chillingworth Crescent has been a problem for a long time.

“Through the Great Estates programme we have eased the parking pressure in the area by creating these much needed new spaces.

“This recent work is just one more example of where our residents have voiced their concerns and we have addressed them.’’ Susan Brown, ward member for Churchill, said: “Lack of parking has been an issue that local residents have raised with us over some time.

“Councillor Mark Lygo and I were delighted to be able to put forward Chillingworth Crescent as part of the Great Estates project along with Masons Road.

“We hope that this will go some way to easing parking problems locally.’’ Mr Lygo, the council’s other member for Churchill, said: “The additional parking is a welcome investment.

“There was congestion in the area and measures which improve this is good for everyone.’’ Nuffield Road resident Pete Bonney, 74, welcomed the works.

He said: “It needed doing badly.

“Every little space helps. There are so many flats around there and so many cars.”

But Sophie Moyes, 28, of Chillingworth Crescent, said the new spaces had made little difference.

The married mum-of-four said: “They look all right but we still get people parking on the pavements.”

Other parking schemes in the pipeline include plans for Masons Road in Wood Farm, Fox Crescent, Chatham Road, and Pegasus Road in Blackbird Leys, the Croft Road area of Marston and also on the Barton estate.

Work will also be done to improve communal areas in and around blocks of flats later in the year.