AN AMBITIOUS bid to clinch £3m in European cash could transform four Valleys towns, council chiefs say.

Blaenau Gwent council has made a bid for Objective One funding to help regenerate Abertillery, Brynmawr, Ebbw Vale and Tredegar. With match funding and private investment the total value of the project could reach more than £8m.

By taking an integrated approach - treating the regeneration of the county borough's four main towns as a single project - the council hopes to succeed in its bid for cash to carry out refurbishment and improve local facilities.

The bid was submitted on June 30 and the council should know if it is successful by August 15.

Some of the cash would be used for the much-needed upgrading of the dilapidated multi-storey car park in Ebbw Vale - dubbed the ugliest building in Wales.

Planning permission has already been given to transform the car park and architects Holder Mathias of Cardiff have designed a makeover for it, which will include the present cladding being removed.

The tender for contracts for work on the multi-storey building is due to go out in the summer.

The Euro cash would also pay for a scheme to install a canopy over part of the south end of Market Street, which would protect the town's outdoor market during bad weather.

And it would pay for other improvements to side streets in Ebbw Vale town centre, which has already had many improvements including new modern lighting columns.

Other projects would also be implemented, including:

l improvements to the streetscape in Market Street in Brynmawr, and in Church Street, High Street, Somerset Street and Market Street, in Abertillery.

l improvements to the southern gateway of Tredegar, near the Tredegar Comprehensive School and Bedwellty Park

l enhancement to town centre links - the network of footpaths between Tredegar's centre, the business park and Bedwellty Park.

l funding town improvement grants for all four towns.

Councillor Dennis Owens, the council's executive member for regeneration, said: "If we are successful with this innovative proposal to join four towns together under one bid, we in effect, have an opportunity to bring sweeping improvements to all Blaenau Gwent's focal towns at once, benefiting people right across the county borough."

If the projects are successful in attracting the funding, they will bring improvements to more than 17,000sqm of streetscape in Blaenau Gwent.

The council says it is also set to secure £2.75 match funding and attract over £2.5m funding from the private sector.