FOR Sale signs will go up next month on new homes at the multi million pounds Hartley Hospital housing development -- bringing a new era to the much-loved former hospital site.

Morrison Homes has linked with builder Barnfield Construction of Nelson to start marketing 53 new homes at the Keighley Road site -- 15 years after the hospital was closed.

Prices for the properties on the £6.5million development start at £75,000 and the first families are expected to move into the new homes in July.

Properties include bungalows, mews, townhouses and semi-detached homes. In addition, part of the old hospital building will be converted into nine flats for elderly people.

Building work started nearly two years ago when Pendle council gave planning approval after councillors were told it was the last chance to save the hospital from the bulldozers.

The wings of the hospital, gifted to the town by benefactor Sir William Pickles Hartley, founder of Hartley's Jams, are to go, but the central area will be retained.

Development work was halted when Barnfield diverted workers to other industrial sites where completion dates were more sensitive. Now builders are back and homes are nearing completion.

Ann Wood, of Morrison Homes, who are marketing the site said: "With this development, both Morrison Homes and Barnfield Construction have been very determined to ensure that Hartley Gardens is in keeping with its beautiful surroundings."

The former Burnley Health Authority decided to close the hospital and move services to Burnley General in the mid-'80s, despite a long campaign to save the centre.

Sir William bought the four and a half acre site after offering in 1914 to pay the full cost of building a new hospital for his home town.

Work started after the Great War in 1920 and the following year Sir William laid the foundation stone at a ceremony which attracted "a great gathering of townspeople."

The benefactor did not live to see the hospital open. He died in October 1922.