A HOUSEBUILDER has donated £20,000 to a village green restoration scheme.

Barratt Homes North East gave the money to support the improvement of the village green in Coxhoe, near Durham.

The green has been transformed with landscaping work and the addition of a pit wheel mining memorial, in a project worth around £70,000.

The housebuilder part-paid for the wheel as part of its legal commitment to the community following construction of The Limes housing estate.

Kerry Moore, land manager at Barratt Homes North East, said: “It’s always a pleasure for us to be able to contribute towards a great community, such as Coxhoe, in which The Limes development is situated.

“For the funds to be used to improve the village green and produce something physical that everybody can enjoy makes our involvement even more worthwhile.

“Children from the local primary school, Coxhoe Primary School, came down and they loved the new green, which is great to see.”

Residents had been campaigning for a mining memorial for the village for several years.

The Banner Group, formed 12 years ago to have a new miners’ banner created for the village, bought a genuine pit wheel from UK Coal in Doncaster, which was unveiled during a ceremony in July.