Snibston demolition will cost almost £180,000 - Museums Association

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Snibston demolition will cost almost £180,000

FOI request reveals costs associated with the closure and demolition of the Snibston Discovery Museum
Nicola Sullivan
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The closure and partial demolition of the Snibston Discovery Museum site will cost hundreds of thousands of pounds, a Freedom of Information (FOI) request has revealed.

Leicestershire County Council’s response to the FOI request stated that clearance of the Coalville site, which closed in July after a legal challenge to save it failed, would cost £179, 625.

The council will also have to pay back £146,146 to the Heritage Lottery Fund, which has invested in the museum and its collections. The redundancy costs associated with the closure reached £142,000, although this is lower than the £167,000 predicted.

A report presented to the council’s cabinet on 14 January last year stated that the net cost of operating Snibston site, including the Century Theatre, was £790,000 in 2013-14. If no changes were made to the operation of the Snibston site this figure could increase to around £900,000 in later years, said the report.

The council intends to sell the main museum building to developers, but its plans to create a smaller museum in the site’s adjoining colliery have been thrown out.

A council spokesman said that 37% of the museum’s exhibits will go to Leicester City Council’s museum service, from where they were on loan. Other items are being stored in the site’s pithead buildings, the county council’s Collections Resource Centre and at the County Hall campus, he added.

Concerns have been raised about the future of the Century Theatre, Britain’s oldest surviving travelling theatre, which operates from the Snibston site.

Terri Eyon, the Labour councillor for north-west Leicestershire, said: “We have also lost the context for our lovely museum artefact that still exists – the Century Theatre. Now rather than sitting next to a museum it will be sitting next to a derelict shed. It doesn't have very good access, because this was previously through or around the museum.

"There has been a lot of work put in over the years to build the theatre up so it wasn’t just a museum artefact but actually a living vibrant theatre. It will probably struggle now.”

A spokesman from the county council said that access to the theatre would be maintained during the dismantling of the exhibition hall, which is likely to begin in early spring.


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