A KEIGHLEY trader said a £2.7 million scheme to regenerate the town centre had a devastating impact on her business.

Lauren Ives set up Polished Nails and Beauty salon in Church Street in 2013. She said the part of the Townscape Heritage Initiative (THI) involving the building where she is based dragged on much longer than was forecast, leading potential clients to assume her salon was closed.

She said she was given no advance warning the scheme would affect her business.

Miss Ives added: "I've suffered 22 weeks of loss of business, which included what should have been my busiest time of year.

"I was told it would take two weeks, until complications arose and they had to wait for extra funds to be signed off for progression of the project.

"It took more than 15 weeks to get this sorted, and I've lost more than £9,000 worth of business and many, many clients.

"The paintwork is finally being finished this week. But I want to stress how these projects damage businesses that are hard enough to keep going in such a struggling place."

Miss Ives said her salon had been running for 19 months when she was abruptly informed scaffolding would be going up directly in front of it.

It has only just come down.

"Before this happened, the business was doing well – it was paying its way and I was employing someone," Miss Ives said.

"For the first month after the work started I tried to do as much marketing as I could to make sure people knew I was still here. But it looked like a dark, and dismal building site, and people don't want to come to that kind of environment.

"I had to get a different full-time job to tide myself over, while working my salon appointments for my remaining clients around that job.

"The business was hugely diminished. By now I should be fully booked for Christmas, but I haven't got one appointment."

Miss Ives is planning to stage a re-launch event at the salon from 10am on Saturday.

A Bradford Council spokesman responded: "The Townscape Heritage Initiative, which is funded by Heritage Lottery Fund and Bradford Council, aims to return Victorian and Edwardian buildings in the town centre to their former glory.

"The THI money covers much of the cost of restoring period features on eligible buildings near North Street, High Street and Church Street.

"Unfortunately, while completing work on a property in Church Street, some structural issues arose, which made the property unsafe.

"This had to be addressed before the work could be completed. There was no option but to protect the public and the people working in the building.

"This led to this project taking longer than originally anticipated.

"The builders made every effort to provide signage on the scaffolding in order to show the businesses were still open as usual."