MORE sources of funding are being considered to revive Brighton’s rundown Madeira Terraces.

Brighton and Hove City Council’s executive director for economy, environment and culture Nick Hibberd said that the council would even consider private investors.

But first it was trying to tap into public funds and lottery funding to restore the grade II* listed structure despite some setbacks.

Mr Hibberd was responding to questions about the state of the seafront at the council’s Audit and Standards Committee at Hove Town Hall.

A bid for financial support from the Heritage Lottery Fund failed, for a second time, but Mr Hibberd said that the council had been told that there was nothing wrong with its bid.

Read more: Developer's bold £100m plan for Brighton's Madeira Terrace

Read more: Second bid for Madeira Terraces lottery funding fails​

The fund just had a limited amount of money available for numerous worthy projects nationally.

He said: “We are always hoping for Heritage Lottery funding and will look at a March bid.

“It is not unusual to see unsuccessful bids for the first or the second times.

“You have to keep going for new routes of funding.

“Those bids that are successful have been working with the Heritage Lottery Fund for longer.”

Mr Hibberd said that the council was not relying just on the Heritage Lottery Fund as a source of funding but looking at other grants and opportunities including private investment.

Work is already starting thanks to a widely supported crowdfunding campaign.

The comments represent a change in direction for the council and could revive interest in a project put forward last year.

Brighton resident Roger Wade, founder of retail and leisure development company Boxpark, put forward a project named the People’s Promenade last year.

At an estimated cost of £100 million, he proposed to build a hotel, office spaces, restaurants and shops to attract more visitors to Madeira Drive and transform it into a “world-class beachfront leisure destination”.

But the plan cooled when Brighton and Hove City Council said it was sticking to its plan to get lottery funding for the project.

And in December a campaigner who who helped raise more than £26,000 for the crumbling Madeira Terrace said she will “never give up” on the regeneration project

In total that campaign raised £463,000.

It was set up to restore three of the 152 arches and prove a strong public mandate for future funding applications.

It was suggested at the time that the work would begin during summer last year.

And Mrs Atkins believes that if the work had already been started, the lottery funding bid would have had a better chance of success.

She said: “We can apply again in March but I don’t think we’ll get anywhere if we don’t start the work