MINEHEAD'S Beach Hotel - described by conservationists as a key feature of the town's heritage - could be converted into a retail and affordable homes complex under a scheme unveiled this week. Oxfordshire-based planning consultant Alan Kanerick has exclusively revealed to the Free Press his vision for the Victorian seafront building. Mr Kanerick is a director of Minehead Renaissance Ltd, a company he set up earlier this year with his wife and another partner, which is contracted to buy the Beach from current owner Barry Richards for an undisclosed figure. Months of discussion with architects and other experts over the future of the building, which lies in one of Minehead's conservation areas, has led the company to shelve a possible scheme to demolish it and redevelop the site, a move that undoubtedly would have courted controversy and attracted opposition. Instead, it hopes to carry out a sympathetic restoration and conversion to create a total of four retail outlets at ground floor level and a mix of 14 one and two-bedroom flats for rent on the two floors above. Three units of around 4,000 square metres and one of 1,250 square metres would provide the town with a new convenience supermarket - two major retail chains are understood to be interested - two restaurants and a fast food takeaway. The upper floors would be redeveloped in conjunction with a registered social landlord to meet some of the huge demand for affordable homes in the district. West Somerset Council has identified the delivery of housing as one of its three main priorities and set itself a target of achieving 100 affordable homes to buy and 80 to rent by 2009. But only last month its housing service was rapped for failing to deliver any affordable homes for rent or sale within the last year, with the Audit Commission rating it a zero-star authority out of a potential three stars. Under a controversial policy agreed last year by the council, developers can create up to 15 homes for open-market sale in Minehead without having to provide any affordable element. Mr Kanerick said: "This building has a history as a hotel but I think most people would agree that its does not have a future as such and that alternative uses for it have to be found to ensure its long-term survival. "Conversion is now the preferred route and our hope would be to take it back to its original brick and restore it with sympathy to that when it was built in 1875." Mr Kanerick is expecting to hand in a discussion document to the local planning authority, outlining his plans, within the next week or so as a precursor to a formal planning application. The Beach is one of three seafront buildings which helped establish Minehead's status as a holiday resort following the arrival of the railway in the town in 1874. Together with the railway station, the Beach and four houses - now Westholme and Foxes Hotel - transformed a rough beachside track into a grand Esplanade. The construction of the Hobby Horse/Metropole Court, formerly the Hotel Metropole and before that the Esplanade Family Hotel, in 1894 completed a vision dreamed up by George Luttrell and Thomas Ponsford. The Beach is believed to have been designed by the architect Charles Henry Samsom, building bailiff to the Dunster Castle estate from 1868. Samsom is also thought to have been responsible for the Floyd's Corner building at the junction of Friday Street and the Parade, which mirrors the convex facade of the Beach. Mr Kanerick said he believed his restoration plans would help ensure the future of one part of the "book-end" buildings.