Experts are drawing up a ten-year plan to upgrade an ageing crematorium.

Worthing Crematorium, based in countryside north of Findon, was opened in 1968 and built to cater for 1,000 services a year.

However, at present it is dealing with 3,300 services. Of the 245 cremators in Britain, it is the 11th busiest.

There are now fears that cremators will have to be replaced at a cost of £70,000 but the Worthing site is regarded as too small for modern equipment.

Funeral directors say there needs to be a larger chapel, new waiting room, better parking, a flower room, refreshment room, better ventilation and a chapel of rest. They are also pressing for Saturday services and provision for woodland burials.

During the next five years, Worthing Borough Council, which runs the crematorium, may have to spend £200,000 on improved car parking, £50,000 on internal refurbishment, £50,000 on new windows and doors and install a new heating system that has not been costed.

In the main chapel, the pews may be taken out and replaced with seats to increase capacity because some services are overcrowded.