PLANS are being drawn up to reinvigorate the centre of Cefn Mawr by building a cable car system.

The plans are part of a greater scheme involving the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, to make the most of tourism in the area and revitalise the region.

The idea is to build a cable car system between the Windborne Gate car park and the Crane area of Cefn. The cable car will be linked to the Ebenezer centre with the plan being to reopen the building as an arts and visitor centre.

The building, located on Crane Street in the centre of Cefn-Mawr, was renovated in 2008 and was intended to be used as a community centre but a lack of footfall meant funding was heavily reduced until the centre closed altogether in 2013.

David Metcalfe, Cefn Community Councillor & AONB champion, said: "The Ebenezer failed for two main reasons, a lack of foot fall and no parking. By linking the Windborne Gate to the Ebenezer with the cable car system, the problems are solved.

"There are 330,000 people visiting the aqueduct annually and if only 10 per-cent ride the cable car, this still delivers 33,000 tourists onto our streets, enough to keep the Ebenezer busy. Our main problem will be getting WCBC & partners to work with us, but we hope they will come around since this will be the key, they seek and a major boost to the economic future of our community.

We estimate the visitor count will rise to around 400,000 annually and our mean estimate of operation is 20 per-cent which will provide the operating costs for the Ebenezer. This means that we will be able to offer the display space to our community.

"We also intend to run training programs as we originally said in 2012 to work with our young people. This will enable them to work with us and look for work outside our community both on and offshore which we will encourage them to do.

"To help us do this we will be looking at establishing links with other bodies such as the Princes Trust. We intend to pursue this on behalf of our community and can be successful if the relevant bodies will work with us."