Oriel, the joint initiative between Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology and Moorfields Eye Charity that would see services move to a brand new integrated centre on the site of St Pancras Hospital, has taken another important step forward. In May this year, the Greater London Authority approved plans following Camden Council’s planning committee making a resolution to grant planning permission for our new centre in June 2021.
The final step in the planning process was for Camden Council to generate the decision notice which formally grants full approval for our Oriel planning application. This decision notice has now been granted. This is the culmination of several years of hard work – including staff, patient, student and public consultation on the relocation and design of the new building and an extensive planning application process with plans submitted to the council in 2020.
It is an important milestone in the Oriel journey which would see existing services at Moorfield’s City Road site and the IoO’s Bath Street site, into a new purpose-built centre on the two-acre site in the borough’s Knowledge Quarter. The new centre for advancing eye care, research and education would deliver the integration and innovative conditions needed to continue the ground-breaking work efficiently and in partnership, enabling the speedier delivery of new treatments and therapies for patients.