£200,000 revamp for city museum

A scheme to transform the ground floor of the city's Castle Museum is the latest project to help attract hundreds of thousands of extra visitors to York.

The Castle Museum has been heralded as one of the most important schemes that the listed venue has seen in recent years, and is the latest phase of a multi-million-pound investment across the city.

The 200,000 project will redevelop the entrance area and is aimed at promoting the museum as a cafe and team room by capitalising on the stunning views across the Eye of York and Clifford's Tower opposite.

The commercial director for the York Museums Trust, Michael Woodward, said: "The tourism industry is so vital to York's economy and we have developed a strategy to try and ensure our venues can operate effectively in what is a very competitive market.

"At a time when there are obvious financial pressures, we are having to focus our investment carefully, but this is one of the most important schemes we have undertaken at the Castle Museum in recent years.

"It will give a completely fresh perspective to the museum, and will transform the area which visitors first see when they walk in.

"There is a series of redevelopments which are under way or which have been recently completed at the city's museums, and these will all hopefully help attract more visitors to the city and boost the tourism industry."

The redevelopment of the Castle Museum will see the existing cafe moved from the first floor to the ground floor, the gift shop being shifted to the rear of the building to free up the space required.

A breeze block partition which is currently shielding storage space from the public will be removed to open up the entrance area as well as making it easier to guide visitors around the museum, which is split into two halves.

The museum opened in 1938, and is based in the city's former jail that dates back to the turn of the 18th century.

A planning application has been submitted to York Council's west and city centre area planning sub-committee, and the scheme is expected to be given the go-ahead on Thursday next week.

If the plans are approved, work is expected to start later this month, although Mr Woodward stressed the museum would remain open to the public while the redevelopment is carried out.

The project is the latest to be undertaken at the Castle Museum, with other redevelopments including an overhaul of the venue's replica Victorian street attraction, Kirkgate.

A separate project was unveiled last summer to give visitors more of an insight into the secrets of the building's infamous cells, where highwayman Dick Turpin spent his final hours before he was hanged in the city in 1739.

The York Museums Trust has spent more than 4m during the last five years on schemes updating the Castle Museum and its other venues, including the city's art gallery and the Yorkshire Museum.

The biggest project which the trust has undertaken is currently under way at the Yorkshire Museum, which is undergoing a 2m redevelopment.

A new exhibition space is due to be created in the autumn on the first floor of the York Art Gallery, which has had more than 1m invested on it since 2005.

Elsewhere in the city, the famous Jorvik Viking Centre, which is run by the York Archaeological Trust, reopened last month after a 1m revamp was completed.