A CHILDREN’S soft play centre in Dalgety Bay has closed unexpectedly, leaving parents dismayed as their kids’ parties have been cancelled at short notice.

The news came to the shocked parents through The Play Planet’s Facebook page around 10pm on Tuesday, in a post which advised that the centre would be closed until further notice.

The centre was encouraging parents to join them for their Halloween party as recently as last weekend. Many parents who had booked and paid for parties this weekend expressed their disappointment at not being contacted directly. Lorna Bowman posted, “Not to inform people who have booked parties, before this announcement was put on FB, is really not on. All that this has achieved is confusion and anger.” The Play Planet was part of The Scarborough Muir Group’s £4million plans for a site in Donibristle Industrial Estate, which would have seen the existing building flattened to make way for brand-new purpose-built premises for the centre.

However, the Press reported last month the plans had stalled amid fears the development would almost create a “second town centre” that would compete and draw customers away from the existing shops.

Graeme Carling, whose wife Leanne Carling is director and owner of The Play Planet, told the Press, “We’ve been making a loss for two-and-a-half years – we’ve been financing it out of our own pockets.

“The situation with the development has had a real impact on us. We’ve been stuck in limbo because we couldn’t finance investment on a site that potentially could have been knocked down the next day. We always thought it would be imminent but it has dragged on too long.

“It has been a real sad day for us and we’ve kept it going at our own cost. We’ve lost £250,000 of our own investment.

“It’s a horrible set of circumstances and we desperately wanted to stay open and keep our staff in jobs but we didn’t have enough money to pay the bills. It’s highly unlikely that we will re-open. Everyone that has already booked will get full refunds and we are contacting everyone today to let them know.

“It’s with a heavy heart that we made this decision.”