WINCHESTER civic chiefs were today due to approve the planning blueprint for a huge redevelopment that will change the face of the city centre.

The ruling Cabinet was due to discuss the planning brief for the Broadway-Friarsgate area that will transform a massive chunk of land in the middle of the city.

The city council wants to see the rundown area of shops, medical centres, warehouses, empty offices and bus station redeveloped with 100 flats, shops, public open spaces, a new bus station and medical centres and possibly a hotel and nightclub.

Well-known buildings such as the bus station, Friarsgate and St Clements medical centres, Kings Walk shopping centre and possibly the Friarsgate multi-storey and antiques market would be swept away.

Silver Hill and Tanner Street will be rejuvenated as major shopping streets.

The scheme is estimated to be worth up to £90m.

The city council has signed a deal with London-based property developers Thornfield which are negotiating the purchase of property with various landowners.

The scheme is potentially controversial but the city council believes the city must have more shops to prevent shoppers being lured to the bigger centres at Southampton, Basing-stoke and Hedge End.

A public consultation has been held this spring and the council ideas have been generally welcomed.

The city residents' association, which is often a critic of the council, hailed the planning brief as a "model of its kind."

It argues for the preservation of the antiques market, the creation of a small museum for archaeological finds and the opening up of the underground streams of the River Itchen.