FIRE chiefs today welcomed news that up to 500 empty ex-council houses are to be demolished as an official planning application was made to bulldoze them.

Twin Valley Homes has earmarked houses across five estates in Blackburn with Darwen for destruction as part of its plan to get rid of unpopular stock.

Houses on the Roman Road, Temple Drive and Lincoln Road estates in Blackburn and the Two Gates Estate and Ellenshaw Estates in Darwen will be demolished.

Lincoln Road will lose 154 houses, Roman Road 137, Ellenshaw 73, Temple Drive 40 and Two Gates 41.

It has now submitted its first planning application, requesting permission to start demolishing the first 77 homes.

Homes on Broughton Close, Carnforth Close, Fishmoor Drive, Flimby Close, Holmbrook Close and Ravenglass Close are all included in the planning application. All are on the old Roman Road estate.

The move to demolish them first comes less than six months after fire chiefs warned they would go to the Fishmoor area only with police guard.

It followed several incidents where youngsters had set fire to empty houses to lure fire crews to the estate.

Once there, the fire crews found themselves being pelted with stones and bricks, with some youngsters even trying to tamper with the fire tenders.

Fire chiefs had threatened to leave the empty houses burning rather than risk their fire officers' safety.

Twin Valley also pledged to find out who the culprits were.

Station officer Andrew Barnes said: "The problems we did have on the estate have stopped more or less now.

"Overall though, we welcome the fact that these houses are coming down.

"Most ex-council houses are made secure quite quickly, but they still cause problems for us.

"Children seem to enjoy playing in them and starting fires. There are a lot of empty houses around and it will be good to see them go."

Twin Valley Homes have no plans to build new homes on the site once the houses have been demolished.

Many of the homes have been boarded up for several years and are deemed unpopular both because of their style and location.

Because the planning application was submitted only this week, it was not considered at last night's planning and highways committee meeting.

On both Broughton Close and Carnforth Close, 17 houses will go, on Flimby Close 20, 14 on Holmbrook Close and nine on Ravenglass Close.