An independent survey has found that a big majority of Coventry people wants the new super hospital to be built in the city centre.

The survey was conducted by Coventry University at the request of the city council, which is pushing for the hospital to be built on the site of the current Coventry & Warwickshire Hospital in Stoney Stanton Road, rather than at Walsgrave.

The university was asked to gather the views of the Coventry public about which site they favoured and the survey shows that 72% of those asked preferred the city centre option.

Councillor John Fletcher, leader of the city council said:

"The university interviewed 1,673 people, a perfectly satisfactory number for a statistically viable poll.

"It showed an overwhelmingly majority for the city centre site. There was even a majority among those people living in the Walsgrave postcode."

The poll showed that 63.7% of people preferred the city centre option, 24.9% preferred Walsgrave and 11% were unsure, had no opinion, did not know or gave some other answer. Of those who expressed a preference therefore, 71.9% were in favour of the city centre and 28.1% for Walsgrave.

Councillor Fletcher said:

"Now we need everyone to get together to do what the people of Coventry want. It is a more do-able scheme than Walsgrave and the major players should now get together to produce a satisfactory scheme to satisfy everyone’s wishes.

"The people of Coventry have a gut feeling that there are huge benefits to the city and its population by having a city centre hospital."

Councillor Fletcher said the city council would be releasing an economic and social study tomorrow on the effects of the city centre site.

"It is good news," he said. "There are significant benefits."