New cinema among town development plans

Plans for a cinema, cafe and leisure hub in a town in Nottinghamshire have been unveiled.

Newark and Sherwood District Council has tabled its designs to demolish the Forest Centre and the Lloyds TSB bank in Forest Road, Ollerton, and the town hall in Sherwood Drive, to make way for a mixed-use scheme.

In their place, it is intended that a new, two-screen cinema will be built, alongside space for smaller businesses, a cafe, and customer services and office space for the authority.

Three council homes will also be built as part of the scheme, which is set to be discussed at a planning meeting on 4 June.

Funding for the scheme, which forms part of the wider regeneration of the town centre, has come from the former Conservative government's Levelling Up fund.

According to the plans, the new homes will come in place of the town hall and will be affordable rent properties for the council's own stock.

The area between Rufford Avenue through to Forest Road would feature two large buildings.

One of the buildings would include space for seven small or medium-sized businesses on the first floor, while the ground floor would have room for a retail unit, town hall offices, a staff room, meeting rooms, shared offices for the council, a public entrance and lobby, a customer service area, and toilets.

The other building would be used for the cinema and an additional retail unit.

Nottinghamshire County Council's highways department has raised concerns in relation to parking demand and availability, and improvements have been suggested.

It is anticipated that, after the plans are approved, demolition and site clearance will take place in the autumn, before construction begins this winter.

Paul Peacock, leader of the Labour-run district council, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service the scheme is expected to be completed by April 2028.

"This is another milestone," he said.

"A lot of our coalfield towns and villages have been neglected over decades [and] my time as leader has been about how we can get investment into them."

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