THE OWNERS of Barry Island Pleasure Park have today revealed plans for a multi-million pound development on the site - which will include seafront apartments and a fairground.

The Barry Island Property Company (BIPC) - owners of the Barry Island Pleasure Park and the adjoining Dolphin pub and restaurant since 2007 - said they are negotiating with a significant leisure operator to take over the existing fairground site.

The operator, it said, has the necessary experience and financial backing to provide a strong relevant offer on the existing four-and-a-half acre site.

The site would also incorporate retail elements.

A planning application was submitted to Vale Council planners on Friday, November 21, for a modest development on the current Dolphin public house and restaurant.

The plan consists of more than 4,500 square foot of four modern commercial units opening onto Friars Road with 25 mainly two bedroom units built over.

The scheme has been designed to take up the same footprint as the Dolphin’s building to ensure the remainder of the current fairground site can carry on with its existing use.

A BIPC spokesman said: “During the last 10 months, we have had to go back to the drawing board to find a new solution for the site and this has included commissioning a feasibility masterplan to examine a wider vision for the whole of the Island frontage to complement the outstanding beach. Presentations have been made to representatives from the Welsh Government, the Vale of Glamorgan local authority and a variety of other potential partners to ascertain if any additional investment would be available to support the leisure activities on the island and the Barry Island Pleasure Park. We have also entered into discussions with a number of leisure providers seeking to secure a development partner.

“Recently, we have received very good support from a number of influential local parties.

“We have always been aware that a strong leisure operator would be a significant integral part of any development to re-establish Barry Island as a significant South Wales tourist attraction.

“Therefore we have spent a lot of time to find an operator with both the necessary track record and interested in making the significant investment required to make a success of the site. We have been faced with the fact that the size of the site that we owned is not large enough to satisfy the needs of many of those operators as their offers required much larger sites to deliver a viable solution for the level of investment they would have to make.

He added: “We are continuing to invest time and money to secure the delivery of these two separate matters and upon their successful conclusion, the shareholders will be in a position to finalise contracts in the early part of 2015 to allow it to happen as soon as possible.”

The owners said they had already made a significant six figure investment on the consultant team, planning reports and other advice and had received no public funding.

BIPC has also not made any applications for the demolition of the site.

Some localised demolition took place due to storm damage on one of the older fairground rides and clearance from that demolition is ongoing.

Dennis Harkus, of FocusBARRY – an independent community group with Wales’ largest town at the heart of its agenda, said: “I understand and agree that any redevelopment of this site should not be overly biased towards residential or commercial uses. However, I think most people would want to see tourism and leisure facilities at this traditional location and that will probably require some dwellings to make a scheme viable for any developer.”