Plans to build a much-anticipated skate park in Cromer have received a big push forward after campaigners secured a lease for the land where it is to be built.

Members of the Cromer Skate Park group, which is behind the bid, signed the lease for a section of land known as the Meadow earlier this week, and have hailed the move as a 'massive milestone'.

Having the lease will now allow campaigners to apply for more grants and funds as they work towards securing the £150,000 needed to build the park.

Sebastian Gasse, vice chairman of the skate park group, said: 'We're delighted. It's been quite a process to get this but all of the parties involved have been really helpful in making this happen.

'We're really ambitious and want to have something really good, and the young people want a good skate park too. To do that we have got to raise quite a bit of money and the lease was an obstacle.

'It's been a real block for us not being able to say we have got all these things lined up, but now we have got all that there isn't anything stopping us applying for more and different grants.'

As well as the lease, the group has also successfully secured charity status, which campaigners hope will also help towards securing further funding.

About 20pc of the total needed has been raised and future fundraising events are already in the pipeline, including a masked ball.

And the coffers were given an unexpected boost after an elderly couple, who holiday regularly in Cromer, donated £250 towards the project.

The holidaymakers, both aged 79, were moved into sending the cheque after meeting some of the town's 'polite' young skate park campaigners, and hearing about their plans first hand.

Mr Gasse said it was 'heartwarming' to hear how the couple had been spurred into action. 'That doesn't happen every day –that's a very special thing and it also reinforced our view that we have got some really lovely young people in Cromer,' he added.

'They just need to get the right facilities and it's only fair that we sort something out for them.'

What do you think to the plans for the skate park? Email EDPLetters@archant.co.uk