AMBITIOUS plans for a £46million college on a derelict site in the heart of Ashford have been unveiled.

The Ashford Learning Campus, as it will be known, has been hailed as the first of its kind in the country and will cater for 14,000 students aged 14 to 19, twice the number presently studying in the area.

Education chiefs say the college will provide a world-class complex to train and educate thousands of students from across the county and be instrumental in addressing the area’s major skills shortage.

The college is scheduled to open its doors to the first students in September 2009 and will provide an extensive range of courses, including graduate studies. It will be built on a 17,500 square metre derelict site next to the railway line between Elwick Road and Victoria Road.

A detailed planning application for the college, which is being developed by South Kent College and the Learning and Skills Council, is expected to be submitted in the autumn. Architects are planning to design what they say will be a striking steel and glass structure of up to six-storeys high.

South Kent College principal Tom Johnson said the college would turn out large numbers of students with much-needed vocational skills, such as plumbers, mechanics, engineers and electricians. But he stressed that there would also be an increasing number of graduates, along with courses in the creative arts and media.

"It has become clear that for Ashford to attract new businesses and for existing ones to flourish in what is a growing town, we need new opportunities for skills training for those who will become their employees. The facilities and courses we have do not meet that need," he said.

The number of graduates studying in the town is expected to rise from 600 to about 1,600, while the number of full-time younger students would reach 2,000 in five years.

Martin Bacon, the managing director of Ashford’s Future, the body overseeing regeneration schemes and development in the town, said: "This is a vital development for Ashford and one of our priority projects. The campus will play a crucial role in ensuring we have the right skills to remain competitive."

The money to build the college will come chiefly from the Kent and Medway Learning and Skills Council (LSC), along with government cash and money raised by selling off some of South Kent College’s existing sites.