A ROAD used to access a key town centre car park is to be closed for seven months.

Theatre Street in Ulverston will be closed from Monday March 25 with work set to start to convert the former town hall into 17 flats.

At the close of 2017 South Lakeland District Council granted planning permission for South Lakes Housing’s development at the 110-year old building in Queen Street.

The plans attracted objections from a group called Zone A Residents’ Association who argued the affordable apartments would attract “the wrong type of people” to Ulverston.

Construction is being undertaken by Leck of Barrow.

A road closure was deemed necessary to store equipment and a site office and original plans suggested Benson Street would be used for this.

However Cumbria County Council has now confirmed that Theatre Street, used by many to cut from Queen Street to the car park in Theatre Street, will be closed for 30 weeks.

Benson Street is named as the diversion but it has not yet been made clear if the current one-way system heading up to Queen Street will be reversed.

Archaeological studies of the site reveal a building was situated on the land as early as 1823.

A showroom was built between 1873 and 1891 and from 1901 to 1904 plans were submitted to convert the premises into the town hall.

When work starts preliminary construction will include attempting to uncover and potentially preserve “buried archaeological assets of local significance”.

The archaeological study revealed: “If (a) ditch (under the town hall) is indeed a burgage plot boundary this is extremely significant in the understanding of the development of medieval Ulverston, indicating that the burgage plots were originally much longer in this area.”

A medieval term used in the 13th century; a burgage was a town rental property owned by a king or lord.

The Mail has contacted the council for clarification about the road closure.