Plans to build a 'social sciences quarter' at the University of Warwick look set to be given the go ahead next week.

Warwick District Council's (WDC) planning officers have recommended that permission be granted for up to 32,000sqm of 'education floorspace' to bring the faculty all under one roof.

Currently the 14 social sciences departments are spread across campus, but the university wants to bring them all together in a new building at the junction of Gibbet Hill Road and Westwood Heath Road.

No exact designs for the new building have been put forward as part of the planning application, as it is only the outline stage.

But district planners have recommended to councillors at next Tuesday's (August 15) planning meeting that approval be given.

"Having regard to all the possible impacts of the proposed development, in relation to visual and landscape impacts, the setting of heritage assets, residential amenity, highway safety and traffic, drainage, ecology, sustainability measures and air quality, officers are satisfied that the site can accommodate the proposed quantum of development without causing demonstrable harm to the aforementioned matters," a council report said.

If approved, the university would then be required to submit a reserved matters application with the full design for the development.

The application says the "world leading" department is currently limited by the "lack of high quality, purpose built, academic accommodation". 

"Many departments are scattered across the university estate, often in facilities that are not fit for purpose, which restricts collaboration, innovation, and economies of scale," it added.

"The social sciences quarter aims to release the full potential of the faculty by co-locating all departments on a single site, in purpose built accommodation."

If approved the building would sit at the junction of Gibbet Hill Road and Westwood Heath Road (image via planning application)

The plans promise the scheme will "deliver a highly sustainable, low carbon building" for the "new front door to the campus".

The application also promises to create a design "to promote openness and demonstrate the university's commitment to quality, longevity and sustainability". 

The quarter forms the next phase of the university's campus strategy to 2030, having recently opened the new faculty of arts building, arts centre and the interdisciplinary biomedical research building at the Gibbet Hill campus. 

If the scheme is approved, a piece of art in memory of Coventry-born Sir Frank Whittle and aerospace engineer Sir George Cox, would need to be moved elsewhere on campus.

See the full plans here.