Town's £450m revamp scheme starts

The existing library will shut once the new one has been built

A £450m facelift for Slough has been given the official go-ahead and work is due to begin in October.

Planning for the Heart of Slough project has taken three years and the cost has more than doubled.

The first job is to build a replacement for the Brunel Way bus station, made famous in the opening credits of the BBC TV comedy The Office.

The project will also include 1,500 new homes, offices, a revised road layout and new transport infrastructure.

Slough Borough Council's planning committee approved the proposal last week and the project officially began on Tuesday.

Hotels and cafes

The town is also set to get a new library, named the Learning Curve, next to St Ethelbert's Church.

Once that is complete and library services are up and running, the existing library will be removed to make way for a new complex of shops, hotels and cafes.

We're providing open spaces for pedestrians and carefully placing pedestrian crossings Andrew Blake-Herbert Slough Borough Council

The new bus station will be built on the site of the existing one, as well as on land where a derelict office building and a multi-storey car park currently stand.

It is due to be completed in 2011, and the Learning Curve during 2012. Other parts of the project will take longer.

Andrew Blake-Herbert, strategic director of resources for Slough Borough Council, said: "This approval gives us the go-ahead to make Heart of Slough a reality.

"We want to make Slough much easier to use by pedestrians and people who want to use public transport.

"So we're providing open spaces for pedestrians and carefully placing pedestrian crossings to provide a natural and safe route between the bus and the railway stations and the town centre."