Bradford’s flagship City Park will not now open next month as hoped.

Construction work has been under way since December 2009 to create Britain’s biggest urban man-made water feature on the six-acre site next to City Hall.

The park will have a vast, circular mirror pool, made of more than 250,000 granite cubes, and more than 100 fountains, as well as jets and causeways.

But Bradford Council has now confirmed that the opening of the £24.4 million showpiece development will be in November – although some building work will continue into early next year.

Barra Mac Ruairi, the Council’s strategic director for regeneration, had stated that the work was “progressing towards the scheduled completion in September” in comments published on the Council’s website at the start of the year.

In a statement last night, the Council said: “We expect construction to be completed in November, with some non-construction work (e.g. pavilion building fit-out) taking place until early January.

“Like all major construction schemes, adjustments needed to be made to the design once work began on the ground. The knock-on effect of this has been, for example, that earthworks programmed for the summer had to be pushed into the winter which has exacerbated the problems. The severe winter conditions also caused some delays, as did unforeseen events like the EDL protest.

“It has not been possible to catch up on the delays over the rest of 2011.”

Councillor David Green, the Council’s executive member for regeneration and the economy, has also conceded that the opening will be “gradual”.

He said: “We don’t want to open it with a big fanfare when there are still tweaks to be made. We need to give it a test run.”

But Coun Green said he was confident that when it does open it will be a “keystone of the city centre”. He said: “It is certainly the biggest thing that has happened in Bradford for at least 50 years, and possibly the best thing that has been built here since City Hall.

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