A £1.5m plan to refurbish Tyldesley Town Hall and create a new community hub has been approved.

The proposals will bring together a wide range of services under one roof for the benefit of residents.

The building will be the new home to Tyldesley library as well as a Life Centre where people will be able to speak to Wigan Council staff and partners for general help and advice.

A flexible working environment will be created for the council and its partners including the NHS and police.

There will also be opportunities for community groups and services which match the needs of local residents to use the facility.

The news comes after community group Driven was successful in securing funding from Historic England to create a Heritage Action Zone on Elliot Street.

Wigan Council will now match fund this investment for the work to the Town Hall.

Becca Heron, director for economy and skills, said: “The work to Tyldesley Town Hall will really complement the work Driven is leading through the creation of the Heritage Action Zone. These plans will boost the regeneration of the town centre and see historic buildings brought back to life.”

Driven’s Heritage Action Zone bid aims to bring Top Chapel back into viable use, tackle local parking issues, refurbish five vacant buildings and encourage businesses based in Conservation Areas to comply with shop front design criteria.

The group has also expressed ambitions to have a dementia café, youth provision, homework club and business incubation space in the town, some of which could be included in the town hall plans.

Ian Tomlinson, project lead for Tyldesley heritage action zone, said: “This announcement is great news for our Heritage Action Zone project in Tyldesley. We had targeted Tyldesley Town Hall as part of our original submission and have only recently been informed that the councils’ proposals for the building mirror what we had in mind.

“The recent Atherton Town Hall development has clearly been a great success and we can’t wait to learn from them and breathe new life into this iconic building at the gateway to Tyldesley.

“We look forward to working with the council to manage and deliver the new services they are planning.

“The timing of this announcement is a great fit for our proposal. We can now include the cost of the Town Hall refurbishment as match funding for the Heritage Action Zone. This will release some of our Historic England funding set aside for the Town Hall to target more buildings of interest and heritage/cultural projects in the conservation area.

“We are currently amending our final programme design due to this announcement ready for submission next month and we plan to start delivering the project from April 2020.”

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