IPSWICH is to get a new bus depot on the site of the former Harris bacon factory within the next two years.The Ipswich Buses depot is to move to the new site, together with the household waste site and industrial units on the opposite side of Sir Alf Ramsey Way.

By Paul Geater

IPSWICH is to get a new bus depot on the site of the former Harris bacon factory within the next two years.

The Ipswich Buses depot is to move to the new site, together with the household waste site and industrial units on the opposite side of Sir Alf Ramsey Way.

The move will enable the company's Constantine Road depot to be redeveloped for housing and offices.

A deal to move to the Harris site, off Hadleigh Road, is expected to be agreed within the next few months.

But it will take 15 months to build the new bus depot – the company is expected to move in early 2004.

The site of the existing bus depot will be cleared and redeveloped, and the company's offices will be converted into homes or offices.

"This is an attractive building and I would think flats here would be very desireable," said Ipswich Buses managing director Malcolm Robson.

"They're between the river and the park, just opposite the football ground and a short walk from the station, town centre and entertainments centre – they're ideally placed," Mr Robson said.

Final negotiations have to be completed with the the owners of the Harris site and the tenants of the small business units off Sir Alf Ramsey Way which will move to the new site.

"The Harris site is 11 acres. We will need four acres, and the other users will have the rest of that site," he said.

The Harris site is a triangle between two rail lines – the main line to Norwich and the East Suffolk line to Felixstowe and Lowestoft – and the River Gipping.

A short length of rail could eventually be laid beside this, giving freight trains the opportunity of heading straight from Felixstowe to the midlands and north without having to turn round at Ipswich.

The Ipswich Village area is set to get another new boost with a major revamp of the Alderman Road recreation ground to turn it into a "village green."

The all-weather pitch on the rec is to be pulled up, and will be replaced by another at the Whitton Sports Centre.

Instead the green is to get a new children's play area, with equipment similar to that at the popular new playground in Christchurch Park.

The new green is designed to make the area more popular for both local children, and youngsters from elsewhere in town who might be able to use it during a shopping trip with their parents.

It will be linked to the town centre by a "Green Route" from Sir Alf Ramsey Way to the Princes Street roundabout for pedestrians and cyclists.