Construction work has commenced on a new 100-space car park at the former Coatham Bowl site in Redcar.

It is part of a wider ambition to regenerate the seafront area with an 18-hole adventure golf course, as well as a new hotel and play park.

Construction on the hotel is expected to take place towards the end of the year, meaning car parking spaces next to Tuned In! will be lost.

The new pay and display car park, with disabled parking and Electrical Vehicle charging points, is scheduled to finish early December to rectify this.

The work was meant to commence earlier this year, but due to inflation and the rise in cost of materials, the project had been delayed while officers made efforts to ensure plans were kept within budget.

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As well as a new car park, a grassed recreation space will be created and the whole of the old bowl site will be tidied up and landscaped.

In early 2021, the Council was approached by Coatham Arena Ltd. to explore locating a 5,000-seat indoor area on the site.

Constructive, but confidential, discussions around the future development of the Coatham Bowl site are still ongoing.

The council will proceed with plans to tidy up the site while these continue and it will not prejudice any future development plans in the meantime.

Cllr Chris Gallacher, cabinet member for economic growth at the council, said: "We want to thank everyone for their patience on this, as our team needed to do a significant amount of value engineering across all of our Coatham projects to ensure we met the budget while costs and materials are increasing. There was a risk that the increase in cost could have threatened the viability of the car park and we had no option to delay and revisit the costings at this very late stage. So, I’m pleased that things are now moving, and residents will soon see a significant improvement to the whole site."