TWO new multi-storey car parks are set to be built in Southend, to free up room for major town centre developments.

Existing ground-level car parks in Clarence Road and Alexandra Street will be scrapped to make way for a Brighton Lanes-style shopping centre with boutique shops.

The Farringdon multi-storey will be demolished and a new library built in its place.

To replace the lost spaces, council bosses are considering building a public multi-storey car park next to Southend Central train station and also on the site of the old South East Essex College buildings, opposite Sainsbury’s in London Road.

Leader of the council Nigel Holdcroft said the NCP site at the train station would be ideal for a new car park.

He added: “I cannot give a clear indication of when it is going to happen. We are reasonably well advanced.

“If it doesn’t come off it doesn’t come off.”

He said he hoped for a resolution as “soon as possible.”

The Alexandra Street and Clarence Road car parks have room for around 220 cars.

Development agency Eng-lish Partnerships has bought them and plans to build a shopping complex, which will be called the Clifftown Boutique Quarter.

Farringdon car park will make way for a new library to replace the one in Victoria Avenue. The council also wants to make space for the expansion of South East Essex College.

When asked about building a new multi-storey in London Road site, Mr Holdcroft said: “It is really too early to say but it is in the right area.”

Traders said parking in the town was already a problem.

Charlotte Volke, manager at the Salvation Army charity shop in Clarence Road, said: “People have come in and complained that there is no where to park around the town.

“For some, it would put them off coming to the centre.

“There are a lot of traffic wardens about and it is expensive to park in car parks.”