Responses to Argyll and Bute Council’s agreement to sell Oban’s former Rockfield school building in the centre of the town to Argyll Community Housing Association [ACHA] for £1, to provide much needed housing – and in a central instead of the usual peripheral location, have been mixed.
There is universal anger at the council’s failed stewardship of an important public asset to the point where its state of dereliction from neglect has brought it to this point.
There are some – like ourselves, who welcome the decision to do something with the site at last and to support the provision of housing in what one has to hope will be of a generous spaciousness and a care for serious architectural merit to replace a building in which Historic Scotland has an interest.
There are some who want to see the building restored and converted, keeping the pace it has earned in the town’s history while serving it in a new capacity.
This group has launched an online petition to save Rockfield, with something around 214 signatures already. People in favour of its retention will find the petition online here.
