Basildon District Council has appointed Community Solutions for Leisure (CSL) as developer of the £35m Basildon Sporting Village. CSL will now finalise the design – and eventually build – the new centre and its 50m Olympic-size sized pool. The council cabinet’s decision brings to an end a 15-month procurement process. Councillor Kevin Blake, cabinet member for leisure and arts said: “The process that we have had to go through has

Plans to build a 39,000-capacity sports stadium on the site of the notorious Maze prison near Lisburn, Northern Ireland, have been dumped by the Northern Ireland Assembly. In a statement, the Northern Ireland first minister Peter Robinson said that although the redevelopment options for the site will be studied further, all plans to build a multi-sport stadium "will not be taken forward". The stadium, which was designed by HOK Sport

The £30m refurbishment of the 2009 Open Championship venue Turnberry golf resort in Ayrshire, Scotland, is underway. The project, designed by Mary Fox Linton in consultation with Historic Scotland, is led by Dubai-based Leisurecorp – which recently bought the site's 113-room hotel and golf course. Half of the 1906 hotel will be refurbished during the first phase of the project and public spaces are being renovated back to their original

Development of the £13.5m mixed-use regeneration scheme at Rotherhithe, Canada Water, have moved a step closer with the appointment of a construction firm by Southwark Council. Contractors ISG Jackson have been signed to build the 3,165sq m library building, which will sit aside a new public space called the Dean Porters Plaza.The development is part of the Canada Water masterplan and is a key regeneration project for the council. The

Plans for a mixed-use development in Wood Green, North London, have been submitted to Haringey Council. The Clarendon Square at Haringey Heartlands scheme will regenerate a former gas works to provide a five-hectare residential district set around a new public square, serviced by leisure and community facilities. The combined project between National Grid Property Holdings (NGP) and the London Development Agency (LDA) has been designed by Make Architects and developed

Deeside Leisure Centre in Flintshire, North Wales, may be demolished to make way for a new facility dubbed the ‘House of Sport’. Flintshire County Council is holding an executive cabinet meeting on Wednesday 1 April to decide how best to move forward with the proposals for a 12-court sports hall, a six-lane indoor bowls hall and an outdoor five-a-side football pitch. A dance/aerobics room, a martial arts room and a

Work is set to get underway on the restoration and redevelopment of a historic music hall in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, after the scheme secured a £1m grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF). The Shropshire Portal scheme will include the development of a new, sustainable museum and visitor information centre at the 13th century, Grade II*-listed Vaughan's Mansion and the Grade II-listed Music Hall and Assembly Rooms dating back to 1835.

A Grade II-listed gallery in Bedfordshire, which dates back to 1841 and has been closed to the public since the 1970s, has been reopened following the completion of a £2.5m refurbishment. The revamp of the Bedford Gallery marks the first phase of a wider £11.3m regeneration scheme designed to unite the Cecil Higgins Art Gallery and Bedford Museum buildings as part of a new flagship complex for the town. Funding

The Shetland Arts Development Agency (SADA) is set to begin construction on its new £12m music, cinema and arts venue on the Shetland Islands in three weeks. The Mareel centre, on track to open in 2010, will be situated on Lerwick's waterfront, has been designed to drive Scotland's burgeoning cultural and economic development forward. Although the development is led by SADA, the Shetland Islands Council and a stakeholder group consisting

The Birmingham Repertory Theatre (REP) is set to undergo a £193m overhaul as part of a joint scheme to redevelop the Library of Birmingham. The joint venture development, led by Birmingham City Council and The REP, is designed by Dutch architect Mecanoo to create a 31,000sq ft "centre for culture and knowledge" in Centenary Square. The library will be built adjacent to the theatre and integrated with The REP at

Northern Ireland's social development minister, Margaret Ritchie, has unveiled designs for the radical overhaul of two Belfast streets as part of a wider scheme to transform the city's shopping area. Donegall Place and Castle Place are set to undergo an extensive revamp after the Northern Ireland government confirmed that it was investing £7m in the scheme, which is set to get underway in May, subject to planning approval. Plans for

Essex County Cricket Club's (ECCC) plans for the £85m redevelopment of The County Ground in Chelmsford are set go before a public inquiry after the government decided to call in the scheme. The scheme will see the complete overhaul of cricketing facilities at the County Ground, including a new pavilion, a new media centre and conference suites, as well as increasing the venue's capacity from 5,800 to around 7,500 seats.

Ipswich Borough Council (IBC) has announced that it is to contribute £75,000 towards a £400,000 scheme to establish a new theatre on the town waterfront, which is scheduled to open next year. The grant will go towards fitting out the new 220-seat Witchbottle Theatre, which will provide a new base for the Red Rose Chain, and will be used for theatre and cinema performances, as well as including a café,

Tottenham Hotspur Football Club (THFC) has unveiled revised plans for the Northumberland Development Project, which includes the club's new 58,000-seat stadium and a new public square. Initial proposals for the scheme released by the club in October 2008 had included a 60,000-seat stadium, but the club has decided to decrease the capacity in a bid to maximise the venue's atmosphere by seating spectators closer to the pitch. KSS Group is

The new Aquatics Centre for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games is starting to take shape after work got underway on lifting the 2,800-tonne wave-shaped roof into place. The lifting of the 11,000sq m (118,403sq ft) roof, which is 160m (525ft) long, is considered to be the most complex engineering challenges of all the Olympic venues. Balfour Beatty is the contractor responsible for building the new aquatics centre, which

A £150m scheme designed to transform the centre of Altrincham, Greater Manchester, is back on track after property firm Nikal acquired the remaining shares in the joint venture for an undisclosed sum. The future of the mixed-use development had been thrown into doubt following the collapse of the David McLean Group, the North Wales-based developer which entered administration in late 2008. Plans for the Altair scheme includes a 3,000-seat ice

Three redevelopment proposals for Forest Hill Pools are due to be the subject of a public consultation this April in Lewisham, London. Lewisham Council's shortlisted leisure centre options come from HLM Architects, Allies + Morrison and Pollard Thomas Edwards architects. It is the second round of consultations to be held on the development, after the council was forced to rethink designs last year. The adjacent Louise House received a Grade

Bewdley Museum will reopen to the public on 2 May following a £500,000 revamp. Improvements at the museum include a brand new Café, new exhibition galleries and updated educational facilities. The museums brass foundry has also been refurbished and the saw yard building has been expanded to provide more space for educational l activities. Museum technician Dave Darby said: "There is still a lot of work to do before we

The completed £13.5m expansion of east London's Whitechapel Gallery is expected to open 5 April. The gallery, re-designed by Belgian architects Robbrecht & Daem and Witherford Watson Mann, is almost double the size after it merged with the adjacent Passmore Edwards library (built in 1892) increasing the 3,000sq ft space by 78 per cent. New features include three galleries dedicated to international art collections, new art commissioned by the gallery's

Londoners are being called upon to give their views on the accessibility of the capital as part of a new survey launched by the London Assembly in a bid to improve facilities for people with mobility issues ahead of the 2012 Games. The consultation will seek to improve access for disabled residents, older people and parents with small children to restaurants, hotels and tourist attractions in order to ensure that

Work on the new Handball Arena for the 2012 London Olympics is set to get underway this summer after the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) appointed Buckingham Group Contracting to build the venue. The Milton Keynes-based company will work with HOK Sport on the construction of the 7,000-seat facility, which has been designed by Make Architects with PTW and Arup and is set to become a 6,000-seat multi-sports venue after the

The Crystal Palace National Sports Centre in London will shortly reopen following an extensive refurbishment. Spearheaded by the London Development Agency, the 18-month project will lengthen the main 50-metre swimming pool and the diving pool to meet current specifications and upgrade the arena, exercise studios and all changing rooms. The listed building is also being extensively repaired with new plumbing and rewiring. The centre is scheduled to reopen next month.

The Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp in Poland is in urgent need of a huge restoration fund to prevent the landmark holocaust site from crumbling into the ground. A Foundation was established in January to campaign leaders in Europe to donate money towards a 120m euro (£110m) Perpetual Fund to help conserve the WWII memorial to human tragedy for the education of future generations. The capital will be invested and ring-fenced by

Plans to renovate the Sydney Opera House in Australia are threatened after the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd refused to back the estimated AUS$900m (£433m, €466m, US$630m) project claiming there was better use for the money. The announcement came the day after the New South Wales Premier Nathan Rees said the restoration was under "active consideration" by the budget committee. If the seven-year-long renewal project was to go ahead, the opera

Plans for a £45m mixed-use leisure scheme in Bishop Auckland, County Durham have got the go-ahead from Hazel Blears, secretary of state for communities and local government. The project, now formerly approved by the Government Offices for the North East, is led by developer Terrace Hill and will result in vacant land being redeveloped into a 150,000sq ft (13,935sq m) leisure park. The park is designed by Lister Associate Architects

Designs for a £10.3m Sports, Culture and Leisure Village in Heywood, in Manchester, are currently the subject of a public consultation. The proposed development, designed by KKA Architects, includes a sports hall, a six-lane, 25m swimming pool, a learners' pool, a dance studio, a 90-station fitness suite and a youth gym, training rooms as well as indoor and outdoor changing rooms. There will also be an additional floodlit artificial turf

Natural England and the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) have called upon the government to help tackle the recession by investing in more green spaces for towns and cities. Ahead of chancellor Alistair Darling's budget statement on 22 April, both organisations have said that funding should be diverted away from road-building schemes to provide new parks, trees and open spaces, which will also help combat climate change.