PLANNERS have given the go-ahead for a fifth screen at York’s Reel Cinema – and improvements to seating in the big screen auditorium.

Reel boss Kailash Suri says he hopes work can start on creating the extra screen within weeks, enabling it to be ready for use by the start of the summer holidays.

He says it will allow the cinema to show more films and give it greater flexibility in moving films around from screen to screen. The project is the latest phase in a rolling refurbishment and redevelopment of the former Odeon picturehouse in Blossom Street, which had three screens – a big screen auditorium upstairs and two smaller screens downstairs – before it shut several years ago.

A fourth screen with 40 seats was opened earlier this year by Reel in former offices upstairs, and now listed building consent has been granted by City of York Council for a 35-seat screen in the former cinema shop, directly below.

A report to the authority by Northern Building Design Associates on behalf of Reel, an independent cinema chain which reopened the picturehouse last year, said staff had received a number of complaints about disabled people not being able to see all films.

“The addition of another screen with disabled viewing facilities will enable the cinema to offer a greater range of films to all customers, including the disabled,” it said.

It also said six rows of seats in the big-screen auditorium – comprising 216 in total – were to be altered to create five rows of seats, reducing the number of seats by 36, but giving customers an extra six inches of leg room.

The report said: “Since the cinema reopened, they have received a number of complaints regarding the leg room for these rows.”

The work on improving the seats is expected to be carried out later in the year.