AFTER more than six years of planning, work on Watchet’s futuristic £7 million East Quay development will finally begin within the next two months.

After months of setbacks and controversy, the scheme’s developers, the Watchet-based Onion Collective, finally signed a lease for a third of the East Quay land with Somerset West and Taunton Council.

There had been fears that delays would jeopardize the payment of a £5 million Coastal Communities grant which was dependant on construction starting on time.

Now contractors will move on site in the coming weeks to prepare to start work before Christmas.

A first major step was taken on Tuesday when three shipping containers which have provided a gallery and studios for the Contains Art project for the past six years were hauled off the site.

“Signing the lease was the last remaining piece of the puzzle and means we can now go forward and start the build,” Onions Collective director Naomi Griffith said.

“After six years of planning out a thousand details and overcoming any number of seemingly impossible obstacles, this feels tremendously exciting.

“We are enormously grateful and humbled by the positivity, support and goodwill we have received. We can’t wait to see the build complete and open the doors in the early summer of 2021.”

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