Flat screen! Eyesore cinema is levelled

A development of smart affordable homes is to be built where Long Eaton’s Galaxy picture house used to stand. There will also be three commercial units that could potentially be shops.

The clearing of the prime site on Derby Road means survey work is now taking place ready for foundations to go in.

The boost is one of a string of flagship projects launched thanks to £25million of Government money that is pouring into Long Eaton after the council helped to clinch a share of what used to be known as the Towns Fund. It has now been renamed the Local Regeneration Fund.

The investment will also see the High Street transformed at a cost of £10million. Work is set to start next spring.

Local businessman Richard Ledger, who chairs the Long Eaton Town Deal Board, told how the cinema on what is called Galaxy Row had been a crumbling blight on the streetscape since it closed more than a decade ago.

He said: “After considerable effort to secure the property and a disused nightclub next door so they could be demolished the scene is now set to create a vibrant new hub of homes and businesses on the site. We even managed to reclaim some half a million bricks.”

The land will become home to 16 flats and four townhouses thanks to a council partnership with affordable housing developer MyPad. Drone footage of the newly cleared site:

It follows four months of painstaking demolition work that avoided disruption on Derby Road.