Youth hostels get £13.5m revamp

More staff training is planned to improve YHA services

Youth hostels across England and Wales are to be modernised in a £13.5m programme of investment.

The Youth Hostel Association (YHA) said 37 would be revamped, with more staff training to improve services.

It said it would also unveil three new hostels, with a £4.3m flagship premises in central London opening next month and others in East Sussex in 2009.

But it also announced the closure of three hostels in North Wales, Norfolk and Gloucestershire.

The first 12 upgraded hostels, costing more than £2.7m, will be ready for the 2008 season.

These range from the clifftop cottage in Pembrokeshire, at YHA Pwll Deri, to city locations in Manchester and London St Pancras.

The new Sussex hostels will be in Eastbourne and Lewes.

'Close and sell'

"When we announced a new strategy for YHA two years ago, we made a firm commitment to providing great hostels in great locations," said YHA chief executive Roger Clarke.

"Some people were disappointed when we announced 32 closures two years ago but we promised at the time it was a means to an end.

"We needed to close and sell less successful properties to generate the funds needed to invest in the future so it's hugely exciting that we are firmly on our way."

Hostels earmarked for £1m-plus improvement schemes include Ilam in the Peak District; Bristol; Pen-y-Pass, in Snowdonia; St David's, in South Wales; Grinton, in North Yorkshire; Treyarnon Bay, in Cornwall; Windermere, in the Lake District, and Exeter, in Devon.

Schemes costing from £820,00 to £600,000 will be at Penzance, Cornwall; Conwy, north Wales and Ambleside, in the Lake District.

Smaller schemes are scheduled for Arundel, West Sussex; Coalport, Shropshire; Coverack in Cornwall; Haworth in West Yorkshire; Port Eynon, in South Wales; Salcombe, in Devon, and St Briavel's Castle, in Gloucestershire.

The three to close are at Bangor, Great Yarmouth and Slimbridge.