North Belfast is to get a fillip with an innovative £200m plan to redevelop not only what is now one of the city’s most disadvantaged areas, but one that also incorporates architecturally and historically unique properties.

The government plans to transform a 27-acre site incorporating the Victorian Crumlin Road Prision and adjacent Girdwood Army Barracks into one of the city's most vibrant spots.

As Belfast’s hospitality trade expands, parts of the ambitious plans include the construction of an hotel in the infamous Crumlin Road Prison – allowing guests a very special experience – and one formerly ‘enjoyed’ by some of Northern Ireland's most notorious inmates.

Some 17 prisoners were executed at the jail, including IRA man Tom Williams, who was hanged in 1942.

IRA men and loyalists including Lenny Murphy, who was leader of the Shankill Butchers, were all kept in the Crumlin Road cells.

The building is currently undergoing a £1m facelift, with improvements undertaken already including restoring the facade to its original 1845 appearance.

Security walls and fencing, which obscured the front of the building throughout the Troubles, have been removed and the railings and main gates repaired and restored.

Equally historic houses adjacent to the gaol entrance, originally used as accommodation for prison warders, have already undergone extensive restoration.

The former Crown Court building, across the road and connected by an underground tunnel - ending in a holding cell under the main courtroom - has already been mooted as another possible hotel, and while it is hoped to transform part of the gaol itself into a museum, the public will have a say on the rest of it.

Social Development Minister Margaret Ritchie said there was also considerable potential for leisure, health, education and housing.

"There is no doubt that the redevelopment of this site offers a once in a lifetime opportunity for physical, social and economic regeneration for the benefit of the entire local community and the wider city," she said.

"If we are successful then this site, at one time, one of the most isolated and uninviting in Northern Ireland, can become one of Belfast's most vibrant and attractive places."

A period of public consultation will end on 22 January 2008.

(BMcC)