A popular café and public toilets in Richmond Park will be replaced to improve the declining facilities.

Richmond Council has approved plans to upgrade buildings and surrounding land near Roehampton Gate, a main entrance into the 2,500-acre park in South West London, as they are in poor condition.

The Royal Parks will demolish Roehampton Café, two toilet blocks and a bike hire facility on the site and replace them with modern buildings. The current facilities are temporary structures installed in 2004 after a fire destroyed the original buildings.

Documents submitted with the application said: "All of these are of very poor quality and require replacing in the near future.

"Despite the poor quality of the existing facilities the site is still very popular and long queues form for both the catering operations and the public toilets, proving that there is a strong demand for facilities at this location."

The council's planning committee unanimously approved the scheme on 9 April.

Paul Richards, manager of Richmond Park, said the plans will 'dramatically' improve the area for visitors, particularly young families.

Mr Richards said: "I would think you would all agree that the outdated café is badly in need of replacement and the landscape around it needs significant improvement.

"The Royal Parks is very pleased to be in a position where an approval of this proposed scheme will allow us to progress with a new purpose-built replacement and the significant associated landscape improvements that will come with it."

The new café will have indoor and outdoor seating, with enough space to cope with increased visitor numbers.

The public toilets will be built in a more accessible area closer to the café, along with two accessible toilets and a baby changing facility. 

The surrounding landscape will be improved with more trees and plants, while a new gate for pedestrians into the park from the Alton Estate, in Roehampton, will be added.

The entrance to Roehampton Gate Car Park will be moved to its north end to make it safer for pedestrians and cyclists.

Two sections of the car park will be converted into disabled parking bays to increase the number of accessible bays from four to 14.

The overall number of car parking spaces will be slashed from 245 to 225.