A church which closed its doors earlier this year could be demolished and replaced by housing.

Harecroft Methodist Church, built in 1900, held its final service in April.

Dwindling congregation numbers and the spiralling cost of repairs to the building forced it to shut.

Now a planning application has been submitted to Bradford Council to bulldoze the church and construct two detached houses.

The applicant is the Bradford North Methodist Circuit, which hopes to be able to sell the site with planning permission attached.

The closure of the church left Harecroft, near Wilsden, without a chapel for the first time in more than 160 years.

The Haworth Road building needed £30,000 worth of repairs – a sum which the tiny church congregation could not afford.

In latter months regular services had attracted only a handful of worshippers.

The Rev Nick Blundell, superintendent minister for the Bradford North circuit, said: “The decision to close the church was one which made itself.

“Because of the structural difficulties with the building it would not have been feasible to do anything else and the church was not used much apart from Sunday services.

“We are conscious that as a registered charity we have to maximise the value of the site and the advice was to seek planning permission and then market the site with the approval attached, which is what we hope to do.”