IT IS not time to put away the popcorn just yet, according to the independent cinema owners trying to bring screenings to the Abbey Hall.

It was revealed last month that the cost of doing the ‘minimum’ repairs to reopen Abingdon’s Abbey Hall, which has been closed since 2015, would be £176,000.

But Sue Wiper, who runs The Regal cinema with her husband Ian, said a feasibility report commissioned by the town council which highlighted issues including problems with the building’s electricals need not stand in the way of their plans.

Mrs Wiper said: “As far as we’re concerned from looking at the reports the plan is still very much doable.

“Our talks with the town council have been very positive so far and many of the issues mentioned are things that would need to be done anyway.”

The business owner wrote to the town council, which own the building, in January asking them to consider letting them use the Guildhall’s 1960s extension for screenings.

Mrs Wiper wrote: “Our plan for the Guildhall is to invest in state of the art projection and audio-visual equipment and a big retractable screen which we would remove at the end of our tenancy. We would also invest and install, at our expense, luxury seating.”

It follows the success of The Regal's temporary cinema in the Unicorn Theatre in Checker Walk this winter.

In the longer term the Abbey Hall is set to form part of a new ‘community hub’ in the town. Oxfordshire County Council, which runs the library, and Abingdon Town Council unveiled an agreement to work more closely to join up public services within the town earlier this year.

But the length of time the project could take, especially as no timescales have been revealed, has led residents to press the ‘urgent need’ to reopen the space with almost 200 people turning up for two public meetings in January. A Save our Guildhall petition created in September, has also been signed by more than 2,000 people.

Original proposals for the Abbey Hall extension of the Guildhall were rejected by the town council in January last year when it was decided the scheme was financially unviable.The £3.5m scheme was first proposed in 2013, with a 200-seat cinema set to form the anchor of a redevelopment of the hall, which would have also created a new cafe-bar and saw the building refurbished.

Mr and Mrs Wiper will submit their full proposal to the town council later this month.