The developer behind plans to redevelop Bradford’s Odeon site is gearing up to begin marketing the scheme to potential tenants as a vital legal agreement is due to be completed within days.

John Downes, managing director of Langtree, which intends to demolish the 1930s cinema building and create offices, a hotel and apartments on the site, said the Section 106 agreement will provide the firm with valid planning permission. “That’s when the job starts, really,” he said.

He told the Telegraph & Argus: “There is a more pressing need than ever for every city pushing hard to promote it’s economic development credentials to have a grade A office offer, and Bradford is no different.

“Outside of London there is no speculative development at all. We need prelets – more than 50 per cent, before we can get the funding from the banks and allow the scheme to go ahead.”

He said they would have to take a “very elegant marketing campaign” forward, and had some concerns that any negative publicity created by the campaign to save the Odeon building could make potential tenants think twice about signing up.

“They might not want to be seen as the catalyst for the building being demolished,” he said. “But we will work hard to make sure any potential tenants see the benefits of the scheme and market Bradford to them.”

The completion of the agreement – which is currently out for signing – will then give Langtree eight months in which to demonstrate to the Council that its scheme is viable, at which point they will be able to demolish the Odeon building and must begin construction work straightaway. The £40 million scheme is expected to take 15 months to complete, so the New Victoria Place building could be up and running in two years.

Mr Downes said the company was financially secure with net assets worth £80m and that they were committed to delivering the scheme. Consortium Langtree Artisan won a design competition to redevelop the site with a brief of creating grade A office space. A development agreement was subsequently signed and its plans were approved by Bradford Council planners in 2009 subject to the legal agreement. Artisan H has since gone into receivership and Langtree has taken over the once joint venture.

Current owner of the site, the Government’s Homes and Communities Agency, which inherited the building from Yorkshire Forward, will continue to own the site until the scheme is completed.

A spokesman for the HCA said: “We’ve begun the process of signing the Section 106 Agreement for the New Victoria Place scheme on the former Odeon site in Bradford.

“We expect to finalise the documentation next week, when the development agreement will go unconditional.”

The building is currently surrounded with scaffolding and plastic sheeting while £700,000 of work takes place to repair the roof and remove asbestos.

A campaign to save the building has been growing with protesters last month unveiling alternative plans to turn the building into a music venue and archive should it be saved.