A MAJOR fundraising drive is underway in Tenbury in a bid to improve facilities in the town including big improvements for young people.

The projects that are on a ‘hit list’ prepared by Tenbury Town Council will cost in the order of £150,000 and will be heavily dependent upon successful bids for money.

Tenbury Town Council has hired Caroline Palethorpe to prepare the bids and she is hoping to secure the money to enable the first of a number of big projects to go ahead early next year.

First on the list is a scheme that would more than double the size of the skate park in the town centre. This would increase from 28 metres by 20 metres to 28 metres by 50 metres.

It would involve completely replacing the tarmac surface with a new special covering of powder concrete.

“The surface was badly damaged by the floods in 2007 and needs to be replaced,” said Ms Palethorpe.

“There has been very active involvement from the young people in preparing the specification and they have done a lot of research into what is needed.

“The skate park dates back to about 2003 and is extensively used by young people in the town by both boys and girls.”

It is expected that the bill for the project will run to £46,000 that includes a contingency for the installation of a new ‘half pipe’ piece of equipment.

An allocation of £5,000 has been made by the Shropshire Housing Association and the outcome of a further pitch for a £10,000 grant from the Severn Waste Fund is expected soon.

Tenbury Town Council has earmarked £6,000 for the project and a further £2,000 is available from the ‘Wheels in Motion’ fund.

All of this would result in £23,000 but it is hoped that funding bids that are being prepared will make up the shortfall.

Ms Palethorpe hopes that the money for the upgrade of the stake park will be in place by the autumn although work would be unlikely to start before next March.

The other potential sources include the developer of the Tenbury View scheme, Malvern Hills District Council, and the West Mercia Police and Crime Commissioner’s Fund.

“It would not make sense to do the work while the park is still being used,” she said.

“The autumn and the end of the year could be wet and we do not know what it will be like in the early part of 2016 so with Easter early next year that would be a sensible time to start.”

A number of other larger projects have been identified as priorities by Tenbury Town Council but these would depend upon securing of grants from various sources.

One of the priorities will be the replacement of the existing pavilion to improve changing and other facilities for people who use the tennis courts and bowling green.

An option available to the town council to fund some of the work would be to take out a long term loan.