A GIANT, man-made landmark could remain on the horizon because of a £7 million rail link.

In the New Year, UK Coal is set to resume long-awaited talks with Wigan, Bolton and Salford authorities regarding the development of the Cutacre tip, better known as the Bluebell, right on the trio's borders.

The towering mass of colliery waste, rated in the Guinness Book of Records as the biggest man-made spoil heap in Europe, has been the source of great debate in recent years between the local authorities, residents and U.K. Coal as they have struggled to agree on the future of the site.

The 40 metre high tip is a local landmark made from over 6 million cubic metres of coal waste extracted from the area's once abundant mines.

Two years ago U.K. Coal who won a 20-year long battle to extract millions of tonnes of coal which years ago had been dumped along with wagon loads of waste.

But now the company says it intends to removed a mere fraction of the original amount, just 125,000 tonnes, because of the prohibitive cost of a rail link to the site which Railtrack has estimated at £7 million.

Consequently, UK Coal has changed its plans and is remaining tight-lipped on the exact details of the new scheme for a business and industrial park on a total of 332 hectares (830 acres). Permission was granted in July 2001 for a 234 hectares (approx 600 acres) scheme.

A spokesman for the company said: "Despite the fact that the world coal market is still very buoyant, the driving force behind the project has become a modest mining plan with an accompanying redevelopment scheme that will create long term employment in the area.

"We have commissioned independent architects to come up with a masterplan for the site which embraces a business park and the first draft of that has now been presented to us.

"The plans we have discussed do include a modest amount of mining. Hopefully we will come up with a scheme that allays fears that have been expressed over the restoration of Cutacre."