ONE of the options to replace St Columba’s and Woodmill was to build the new schools on Pitreavie playing fields.

Fife Council said the sports fields in Dunfermline was one of four sites that was under consideration for a new joint campus.

An area in Masterton and the current Fife College location in Halbeath were also looked at before the Shepherd Offshore site emerged as the “only credible location”.

Councillors will now be asked to back a joint learning campus for St Columba’s, Woodmill and Fife College, with the bill for the schools, before any site purchase costs, estimated to be “around £90 million”.

Initially, 14 sites were identified and this was whittled down to four – none of which the council own – that were “potentially suitable for the provision of a new secondary school”.

The Pitreavie option would have been a hugely controversial move and a report to go before councillors at Tuesday’s education and children’s services committee admitted it was fraught with difficulties.

Executive director of education Carrie Lindsay wrote: “Pitreavie provides an important local location for sport and recreation activities and would require to be replaced if the existing site were redeveloped.”

She added that the existing college site would only become available after the college had relocated and Masterton was “now being redeveloped for other uses”.

Her report concluded: “This leaves the Shepherd Offshore site as the only credible location likely to be available within a reasonable timescale for an additional, new secondary school.”

If councillors agree, the council will approach the Scottish Government for funding, launch a consultation on their plans and try to agree terms with Shepherd Offshore for the purchase of land next to the college’s proposed site.

St Columba’s and Woodmill are both rated ‘C’ for condition and suitability and they have backlog and future maintenance bills of £9m and £24m respectively.

Developing new schools on the aggregated sites of the existing schools was ruled out as the benefits would be outweighed by the need to “make substantial changes to the existing road network, to enable the sites to be brought closer together”.

This solution would not address the looming capacity problems either.

The college has been working on plans for its own £90m campus at the Shepherd Offshore site – where the old Hyundai plant was built – since August 2013.

Last year, the principal, Hugh Hall, outlined their opposition to sharing with St Columba’s and Woodmill.

However, that stance softened when the college was given the funding to buy the site and when it became apparent that the best route of getting the funding from the Scottish Government and Scottish Futures Trust was a joint learning campus.

The college hope their new facility will be open for the start of the new academic session in 2023.

The council said the procurement process could take 18 months.

Ms Lindsay added: “Using the Scottish Futures Trust cost metric and allowing for ICT and off-site roadworks, which are excluded from the metric, the schools’ component of this would be around £90m, exclusive of site purchase costs but before any allowance is made for the greater efficiencies that might be expected from co-locating the college and schools.”