Showdown talks over Weymouth seafront (From Thisisdorset)

Showdown talks over Weymouth seafront

8:52am Friday 31st July 2009 in News By Timothy John

A TALE OF TWO DAYS: Sunkissed Weymouth Beach yesterday and, inset, deserted on Wednesday after a downpour

A CRUNCH meeting will decide if a multi-million pound facelift for Weymouth’s seafront will still go ahead in time for the 2012 Olympic Games. The sale of the Pier Bandstand is among proposals that council bosses will be asked to support as Weymouth and Portland Borough Council bids to rescue its regeneration scheme.

Councillors were rocked in June by the South West Regional Development Agency’s (SWRDA) decision to pull £6.6million it had pledged to the project.

Coun Mike Goodman said the authority should deliver a reduced £2million scheme with its own funds and contributions from Dorset County Council, the Arts Council and English Heritage.

He said: “Despite the setback caused by the withdrawal of the SWRDA funding, we have a responsibility to make the best use of the generous contributions from other partners.

“Tuesday’s debate will concentrate on making sure that our contribution makes the most of our very limited resources and that we get the best for local people as well as the international visitors in 2012.”

Council officers are recommending that £160,000 left in the seafront regeneration budget for the reduced scheme be added to an estimated £500,000 from the sale of two seafront buildings – the Pier Bandstand and 57a, The Esplanade. An additional £200,000 from the capital budget, and nearly £90,000 of funding from the Townscape Heritage Initiative, could take the amount put on the table by Weymouth and Portland Borough Council to nearly £950,000.

Dorset County Council has committed up to of £400,000 to new street lighting and highways and transport improvements, and a further £400,000 is anticipated from the Arts Council to fund ‘artistic’ lighting.

English Heritage has set aside £180,000 to help fund the improvements to the seafront’s Victorian shelters, and could plough another £120,000 towards other heritage improvements.

Councillors will also consider a proposed ‘master plan’ to redevelop the promenade and beach area to attract private sector cash to fund the regeneration. A ‘master planning application’ could be submitted this autumn in a bid to open new, year-round concessions by April 2011.

Proposals to use the former aquarium site for catering, beach rescue and toilet facilities, and altering the TIC, will be considered at the meeting.

Councillors will also consider extending, for a further year, beach and promenade licences that expire before the end of 2009.

Trader Daren Deadman said the Weymouth Beach Group of kiosk owners hoped soon to submit a planning application for three new kiosks in the shape of upturned boats, and new designs for existing kiosks. He added the £1m raised among kiosk holders for their planned developments should be used by councillors as a symbol of belief in the town as they tried to raise funds from other bodies, he added.