RESIDENTS today get they say on the bright new future for a Southampton estate.

Green areas, modern housing, adventure playgrounds and community spaces will soon become a reality in Townhill Park as part of the city council’s grand designs to breathe fresh life into the neighbourhood.

Now residents of Meggeson Avenue and the surrounding streets can have their say on the latest proposals when they go on public display today.

Dozens of homeowners and council tenants in the area will gather at Cutbush Children’s Centre, in Cutbush Lane, this morning to run the rule over the latest vision for their new-look estate as the groundbreaking regeneration scheme moves another step closer.

As previously reported by the Daily Echo, the ambitious £100m project to rejuvenate Meggeson Avenue and its adjoining streets was given the green light by the city’s former Tory leaders back in March 2012.

The original blueprint contained plans to demolish 428 ageing homes to make way for 675 new flats and houses, more than half of which would be “affordable”.

Further new properties were also earmarked for development on Frogs Copse to create a “central park,” while a new parade of shops, a pub or cafe and a village green were also included in the proposals.

Those plans were re-examined by Southampton’s Labour administration later that year following their election victory in May 2012, but the city’s housing supremo, Cllr Warwick Payne, pledged to “follow through” with the regeneration.

However the chairman of the council’s scrutiny committee, Cllr Jeremy Moulton, called in the decision after it was revealed that rents on 450 new council properties would almost double, sparking anger among residents. But following a fresh consultation, the wheels are now back in motion with the first phase of building work due to get under way by 2016.

Cllr Payne, the council’s Cabinet member for housing and sustainability, said: “I would encourage as many of them as possible to go along and view these latest plans to make sure they support them.

“If we are doing something right, we want to know about it so that we can push ahead with it, but at the same time if we are doing something people aren’t happy with then we can amend the plans again.”

The proposals are due to be approved in November, with the first phase of demolition and building work pencilled in for early 2015.

The artist’s impressions will be on display at Cutbush Children’s Centre between 9.30am and 12.30pm today.