ONE of the region's most contaminated sites is being opened to the public today -- as a country park.

The Wigg Island site, in the shadow of the Widnes-Runcorn Bridge, in Cheshire, was used to develop mustard gas during the Second World War.

It was closed to the public in the mid-1990s because of fears of chemical contamination.

But it has now been transformed into parkland with cycleways and bird hides among its features.