WORK is to start on the first of three park-and-ride sites planned for the outskirts of Durham.

Durham County Council is to draw up a planning application and begin negotiations to buy land at Belmont when funds become available.

It is looking to provide commuter parking, linked to bus services into the city centre, near the A690 and A1(M) junction.

The scheme is part of a strategy to ease congestion in the city, which has seen parking restrictions introduced and proposals put forward for Saddler Street to become a toll road.

The Belmont site could also serve as a rail interchange if long-held plans to reopen the mothballed Leamside Line, with passenger services between Tyneside and Ferryhill, come to fruition.

The other proposed park-and-ride sites are at Sniperley and Howlands.

The council is in discussions with the Department for the Environment, Transport and Regions about funding through the Local Transport Plan.

The Belmont interchange will have parking for 600 vehicles - most for park-and-ride users - although officials envisage the maximum increasing to 1,000 in future years.

Environment and technical services officer Chris Tunstall told the council's executive committee: "New infrastructure at the Belmont site will include a junction giving access off the A690, a 600-space car park, combined bus park and ride and rail passenger facilities, a taxi holding area, a pedestrian and cycle bridge, secure facilities for cyclists, CCTV and landscaping.

"Consideration may also be given to a modest facility to accommodate police vehicles laying over while carrying out motorway patrol duties.

"Although the development of this site is linked to the restoration of services on the Leamside Rail Line, the development of park and ride is not dependent on the railway services being in place."

Access to the site is likely to be from a roundabout on the A690.

As well as new park and ride buses, officials hope scheduled bus services will use the interchange.

The council is to seek compulsory purchase and side roads order powers.

Council leader Don Robson said: "This is an absolutely superb scheme.''