A new school on a multi-million pound housing estate is to open in September – a year after it was originally planned.

Children are preparing to move from their temporary mobile classroom a couple of miles away into their new home Rochester Riverside CofE Primary.

The start date was delayed after the contractor fell into financial problems at the end of last year.

It is being run by the Pilgrim Multi-Academy Trust and pupils who were due to start last September have been taught at The Pilgrim School in Borstal while construction is finished.

Developers Countryside and Hyde, which are overseeing the 1,400-home development, stepped in to take over the project.

Until now the majority of youngsters have been ferried to the other Pilgrim Trust site in Warwick Crescent by mini bus.

Polly Bolshaw, from the Rochester Riverside Parents, Teachers and Friends Association, is organising a sponsored walk to the new-build in Gas House Road in a bid to forge links with the community en route.

She said: “Despite the fact that the start of the children’s school lives has not been how they or their families or teachers envisaged, they have been wonderfully resilient.

“They are now very excited about moving to their permanent site where their parents and carers will be able to drop them off to the classrooms rather than the mini bus stop.

To mark the transition they will be setting off on a “symbolic pilgrimage” on the afternoon of Thursday, July 13 from The Pilgrim School along the river to their new home.

They have businesses in the town to sponsor them or make a donation of classroom or gardening equipment.

She said: “We have already had a positive response from some of the High Street – for instance Eastgate House has said we can contribute photos of our class bears for the Treasured Teddies exhibition and have free entry so that the children can go and see them as we go past.

A spokesman for Countryside said: “School construction has continued at pace and has seen great progress since the start of the year after delays due to our specialist contractor going insolvent in late 2022.

“We are on track to have the school open for the new academic year commencing in September.”