URGENT repairs to the former Odeon building are set to overrun by up to six weeks, after its domes were found to be in a worse state than expected.

A £1 million repairs scheme was originally expected to have ended by now, because of a funding deadline, but bad weather and the poor state of timber and steelwork supporting the two landmark domes have set back progress.

Bradford Council, which owns the building, has finished most of the work, but the domes still need to be covered in new copper by specialist contractors - a project expected to take four to six weeks.

Metalwork contractors are expected to start on-site in the coming days.

The repairs have all been paid for by a grant from the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA).

But the cash had to be spent by the end of last month, so the remaining work has had to be paid for upfront.

Project manager Andy Grant said the domes had been in a very poor state, and recent high winds had also delayed the start of work.

He said: "The repairs to the original timber work and steelwork that is actually holding the domes up have cost us £40,000 more than our original prediction, because of the amount of rotten timber and steel we found under them."

But he said this extra cost was being covered by the £1.32 million HCA grant, and added that the overall work to the building had come in £30,000 to £40,000 under budget.

Last year, Bradford Live was chosen to take on the building, after its £18 million scheme to create a major new live venue got the green light from council bosses.

No handover date for the building has yet been set, but the Bradford Live team has been sending various surveyors into the building to get a better idea of its current state and the scale of the work needed.

Director Lee Craven said: "Momentum is important in this project, and Bradford Live want works to continue after the HCA monies are used.

"More non-load bearing areas of the old cinema and bingo hall can be stripped out, and our architect and structural engineer are working on a specification, to be sent out shortly to specialist demolition contractors, for the ‘hard’ strip-out of the main cinema structures.

"Once these structures are removed, the dramatic size of the main auditorium will be revealed for the first time since 1969."

He said in terms of financing this strip-out and the wider project, Bradford Live was talking to public funding bodies and smaller private charitable funds.

He added that in the meantime, they were considering taking out a bridging loan which would allow works on the building to "continue uninterrupted".