WORK has begun on a plot of land on Denton Street, much of which has remained empty for over 10 years.
The third-of-an-acre plot, which used to be the location of the Prince of Wales pub, on the corner of Denton Street and Northumberland Street in Carlisle, is set to be turned into a car park.
The pub closed in 2004, and was demolished in 2010 after a devastating fire on Christmas Eve 2009 shut the premises, meaning the land has been vacant ever since.
A number of terraced houses on the site were also demolished around seven years ago.
The land has been purchased by Graves Cumberland Limited, which owns the nearby Rex Bingo hall.
Daryl Davison, head of operations and finance at Graves Cumberland Ltd, said: "The work that is going on there at the moment is to change it to a carpark as part of our bingo club.
"We purchased the land a while ago now and we recently got permission for change of use, so that's the work that will happen taking it from the eye-sore it was.
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"We expect our carpark will allow us to alleviate some of the problematic issue of street parking around the area at key times. We hope it will be done in the next couple of months or so.
"As a bingo club, we're part of the local community, so we've spoken to a lot of the households around there and everyone seems quite happy with the work we're doing and that's really important to us," she said.
Originally in 2010, a planning application was put forward by Top Notch Contractors Ltd, and subsequently approved, to create 16 apartments, one commercial unit alongside parking space - however that will no longer be the case.
It is understood that the pub was originally built in the 1850s and was acquired by the State Management Scheme on August 22 1916.
It was sold in 1973 to brewer John Smith's.
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