A Disneyland-style theme park expected to attract 50,000 tourists a day is set to be created in Kent.
The £2 billion London Paramount Entertainment Resort to be built on the Swanscombe Peninsula between Gravesend and Dartford will feature rides based on Paramount films, BBC Worldwide shows and Aardman animations – including Wallace and Gromit and Chicken Run.
Attractions based on films including The Godfather and Mission: Impossible are also planned for the site.
The 872-acre entertainment complex would include a large indoor water park, theatres, live music venues, cinemas, rides and restaurants – along with 5,000 hotel rooms.
Due to open in 2021, the tourist attraction financed by Kuwait’s Al-Humaidi family could bring 27,000 jobs to the area according to developers London Resort Company Holdings.
Dr Merilyn Canet, a councillor for nearby Sevenoaks Northern, welcomed the plan and said fears over tourist infrastructure we unfounded.
She told The Independent: "The new resort should be tremendous.
“It will create lots of jobs for the people in the area and should be great fun. We have five years to sort out how to accommodate tourists."
Fenlon Dunphy, chief financial officer of the company, told The Sun the attraction would be a boost to local business.
"This is going to have a hugely significant impact on the economy - we will dovetail into a lot of the other attractions in the area,” he said.
“It will be a game-changer for much of Kent."
But companies from an industrial estate that will be demolished to make way for the park oppose plans for the work, which is due to begin in 2018 after suffering a series of delays.
It comes after the company suffered a setback in February when it overstated its cash assets in an accounting mistake that claimed the firm had more than £291,000, when in fact there was only £952 in the bank.
A spokesman for London Resort Company Holdings told the Independent the error did not impact the overall spend on the project.
Mr Dunphy told the Sun: "The accounting error is just that, an erroneous timing error that was corrected.”
Figures submitted to Companies House revealed the company made pre-tax losses of £14.4 million in 2014.
