AN IMAGE of what the new Tesco store in Abingdon Road will look like has been released by the supermarket giant.

Since the Fox and Hounds pub closed in 2007, South Oxford residents have been eager to see the site in use.

Work started in July but paused for a few weeks, then restarted again last Tuesday.

Tesco said the site would be demolished over the next three weeks, then work would start on constructing the new store.

It is planned the shop, due to open by the end of the year, will provide 20 jobs.

Tesco spokesman Beth Greenhouse said: “We are really pleased to be on site and preparing for the build of our new Express.

“Our store will provide customers with a fantastic range of convenience goods and fresh groceries, as well as creating 20 new jobs for local people.”

The site has a chequered history. After the pub closed in 2007, it was severely damaged by a fire in 2009.

Planning permission to convert it into a convenience store was granted by Oxford City Council in January 2012, but it took 18 months before work started on the site.

There were campaigns both for and against Tesco opening a store, but all parties wanted the site to be brought back into use.

William Rankin, 64, of Chatham Road, led a campaign in favour of the new shop.

He said: “I think it’s going to look very good and it is in keeping with almost the original building that’s there now.”

He described the existing site as “a terrible eyesore”.

Mr Rankin said he was in favour of the shop because of limited alternative facilities in the area, and said it would provide an alternative to the Nisa store for the many elderly people living in the area.

Ms Greenhouse said jobs would be advertised between four to six weeks before the store opens on website tesco-careers.com The Rev Jane Sherwood, vicar of St Luke’s Church in Canning Crescent, said of the designs: “They retain something of the look of the old pub, though on the other hand look very much like a Tesco store.

“Parking and attendant traffic, however, on that already horrendously busy box junction will undoubtedly get worse, as will air pollution.

“For me the issue is more the fact Tesco let the Fox and Hounds site rot since 2007 and has worn the community down so much that they will gratefully accept anything in place of the eyesore they have lived with for six years.”