PEOPLE are angry that an opencast mine has still not been landscaped more than four years after work was completed there.

Residents living close to the Bag Lane site said they are angry nothing has been done to redevelop the area which is an eyesore and potential death trap.

And in a week that the open cast mine at Cutacre was given the go-ahead after 20 years of protests, they warned the same problems could happen to families living in Little Hulton and Over Hulton.

However, the company who will work at Cutacre told the BEN the site will look even better once their four-year project is complete.

A firm called Rackwood Colliery Company began mining at the Bag Lane site, between North Road in Atherton and Leigh Road in Daisy Hill, in the early 1990s.

Their work was complete by 1996. Although they promised to redevelop the site, it never happened.

The BEN carried a story two years ago which warned the land was an eyesore. There was also concerns that a large pool of water had collected which could be very dangerous. Since then, nothing has happened.

Harold Williams, 80, of North Road, Atherton, said Rackwood Colliery Company has always promised to carry out landscaping on Bag Lane overcast mine.

He added: "They said they would make it into a lovely park with trees and everything. Instead, it looks like a World War One site.

"I think people who live near to Cutacre should get assurances it won't happen there." WESTHOUGHTON Town Council leader, David Wilkinson, said the Bag Lane site should have been landscaped when work finished in 1996, but it was delayed and then Rackwood Colliery Company went bankrupt. The land is currently in the hands of receivers Ernst Young.

He added: "It would cost about three quarters of a million pounds to landscape and it could stay like that for many years.

"I said at the public inquiry into Cutacre that whatever happens there must be a bond, whereby whatever work is carried out, the money is there to landscape the site.

"That has happened and Cutacre should be all right, although I still have worries about it."

A spokesman for RJB, which is mining at the Cutacre site, said residents near the site had no need to be worried that the area would be left in a mess.

He added: "We will be redeveloping and restoring the land during and after the four-year project.

"There will be a short term intrusion for residents, but this will be followed by long-term benefits. It will be a haven for wildlife and a playground for local children."

RJB will also be forming a liaison committee with residents over the four-year period to solve any problems.