WORK was finally due to start today on restoring Blackburn's Waterloo Pavilions - ending a 13 year wait for action.

Construction workers have moved on to the site of the three rundown buildings in Church Street, Blackburn, to begin a £1.3million project expected to be completed in November.

Government and Blackburn with Darwen Council cash will fund the restoration.

It will involve making the pavilions structurally sound as well as putting up two new glass structures, effectively creating one big building.

By the time work is complete, council bosses hope to have catering and leisure businesses lined up to go into the buildings.

Blackburn with Darwen Council regeneration chief Coun Andy Kay, said: "We are currently marketing the buildings to attract expressions of interest.

"It is our hope that we will attract some sort of business which will kick-start the retail revival of Church Street and encourage more development, along with pavement cafes.

"It is good that work is now starting. It has taken 13 years to get this far and finally things are getting moving. They will once again become an asset."

Plans have been on the table for nearly two years to turn the three Grade II-listed Pavilions - which date back to Georgian times and have been empty for more than a decade - into the jewel in the crown of a rejuvenated Blackburn town centre.

After years of watching the buildings fall into disrepair, Blackburn Cathedral offered to take over the project in 2001. It was offered a cut-price deal as long as it could find the cash to renovate them. Celebrity chef Nigel Haworth from Northcote Manor, Langho, agreed to open a brassiere in the Pavilions.

But council bosses took control of the project after claiming they had a better chance of getting the money when costs escalated over £1million. Mr Haworth is said to be one of around 15 potential users for the buildings once they are completed by Christmas.

After several false dawns and funding setbacks, councillors were able to announce in January that the project would go ahead. Even then the buildings were caught up in controversy, and they prompted Conservative leader Colin Rigby to describe the plans for them as over-ambitious for "a grotty little mill town."

The North West Development Agency has provided £970,000 and Blackburn with Darwen Council will use £200,000 of its own money, along with £100,000 from the Government's Townscape Heritage Initiative.