Clacton is to get major new seafront leisure facilities - including an eight-lane bowling alley.

The owners of the Clacton Pavilion site, on Marine Parade East, have come up with revised plans for a scheme which was first unveiled three years ago.

Now they want to go ahead with the project which will also have retail facilities, new public toilets, a new promenade area and a refurbishment of the pavilion itself.

The application is being processed by Tendring Council and is due to go before a planning committee later this summer.

A spokesman for Clacton Pavilion said he believed the latest scheme will be just as good if not better than what was on the table before.

"There has been a hold-up due to the uncertainty about the future in the trade," he said.

"The company which was going to provide the bowling alley took a back step on our proposal and two others. Now we are going ahead on our own to provide what will be a 52-weeks-of-the-year facility for residents and visitors."

The spokesman said that various legal and planning matters needed to be tied up but if everything went through without any hold-ups it may be possible to start work this autumn and open next Easter.

The news was welcomed by Mick Page, Tendring Council's portfolio holder for regeneration.

He said: "It is great a new scheme has been put to the council and we will end up with excellent facilities on a prime site on Clacton seafront which will help pull in the visitors all-year-round."

Published Monday, June 23, 2003

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