Demolition has begun on an empty town centre pub.

Bulldozers have started work on flattening The Wheatsheaf pub as it prepares to be turned into a three-storey cafe and flats.

Plans for the boozer’s transformation, in Swanscombe High Street, were approved a year ago by Dartford council.

Now, work has started to tear down the watering hole, which closed in March 2020, and add an extra floor to it.

It will add a two-bedroom flat on the ground level and six two-bedroom flats on the upper floors.

The year before the project was given the green light, the building had been up for sale as a pub with a 20-year lease. but it was understood the freehold was sold when a suitable takeover bid failed to materialise.

The demolition means there are now no pubs left on the high street and only one empty one, The George and Dragon.

Swanscombe resident Victor Openshaw visited The Wheatsheaf regularly from the 1960s until the day it closed.

He remembers the landlord at one time being a man called John Swail, who had a hit in the 1960s under the name Guy Darrell.

“I wasn’t a regular but I knew everyone who went in there and they knew me,” he said. “It’s sad that another pub has gone.

“I think there was once seven pubs in the high street dating back to the 1900s.”

Several people objected to the plans when they were announced, including Swanscombe and Greenhithe Town Council on the basis it had unsuitable parking and the building was "out of character" with the area.

Other objections centred around the loss of yet another pub and pressure on schools, doctors' surgeries and the High Street which is "used as rat-run", it was claimed.

But those in favour said it could help solve housing issues while the cafe element could pave the way for the regeneration of the town in light of a "reduction in groups gathering since the pub closed".