There's a lot to like in a new masterplan for the top end of Watford's high street.

Anyone who has ever stood at the top of the Parade and looked around can not have failed to have noticed the grand, attractive buildings, the Metroland Town Hall, attractive library and twin facades that fan out at the top of the shopping street.

Sadly, they cannot also fail to notice the busy road that ploughs through the middle of it all, and the sea of car parking that surrounds the town hall and leisure centre.

At last, a solution looks to be on the cards.

The draft Watford High Street (North) and Cultural Hub Masterplan, due to be discussed by Watford Borough Council's cabinet next Thursday, outlines how many of the tired buildings and tatty areas that blight the Parade from the Flyover north. It even suggests doing something with the former telephone exchange on the ring road.

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Revealed: Bold plans to reshape town hall and Parade in Watford

The most arresting suggestion is turning the town hall into a four or five-star hotel, then there are plans to pedestrianise the area around the library, with a new museum next door, and the subway beneath Rickmansworth Road banished in favour of surface level crossings.

Watford's beautiful peace memorial would be given the space it deserves, rather than seeming as if it has been tucked away in a corner.

Blocks of flats would be built on the existing town hall and leisure centre car parks, with a multi-storey car park on the site of the present Avenue Car Park in front of the leisure centre.

If all goes to plan, the mayor says we can expect to see work underway within the next five years.

But for all this to be achieved, there are some questions that need to be answered.

What will happen to the cars in this gleaming near future?

That sunny sketch of people crossing Rickmansworth Road on a pedestrian crossing is at odds with the experience of anyone who has sat in a rush-hour traffic jam there.

Watford Observer:

One car and lots of pedestrians - will this ever happen?

The idea that people will willingly abandon their cars because new flats don't have them, and without a proper bus service, is simply fanciful.

The council says it is aware all ideas - including anything involving traffic - must be modelled to make sure it will work.

Then it says it will keep the existing council chamber and committee rooms, but move its offices to an as-yet-unidentified new building. But the town hall is an undoubtedly attractive building both inside and out, and that staircase might be a focal point for a hotel chain.

There are the plans to sell the existing Watford Museum building, which itself forms part of the town's brewing heritage. That idea may not be popular with some.

And there are no figures in the masterplan, and few clues as to how it will all be achieved. Much will need buy-in from the private sector, and Brexit and any economic after-effects are still uncertain.

But this is a bold plan that promises to solve many of the problems that beset the town centre, with attractive solutions. We should welcome it and address any faults in a constructive way.