Chichester District Council, in West Sussex, has approved detailed plans for a controversial £6.9m museum and residential development to be built on what is currently a car park containing remains of the Roman baths.

Created by Keith Williams Architects, the project has taken 19 months to design due to the sensitive nature of the conservation area. The revised designs include a reduction in height and specifications on how the reconstructed stone will be used during building and which will complement other architecture in the historic City area. When recovered, the remains from the city of Noviomagnus Regni will become a permanent exhibit at the 1,300sq m museum, to be called The Tower Street.

The scheme also includes 26 apartments, which the council will sell to offset the development costs along with the current museum building in Little London, when the new attraction opens. Keith Williams said: "It is never easy proposing a contemporary building in any historic city, so I am particularly delighted that the project has received consent. We believe we have carefully crafted the project to sit comfortably within its context, while ensuring that it is invested with a distinct civic sense appropriate to its cultural role in the city."

Councillor Myles Cullen, Leader of Chichester District Council, said: "When the council committed to developing a new museum at Tower Street, we knew that it would be a challenge to create a museum fit for this district's rich heritage. We have also always been clear that the new building should be of the highest architectural quality that we could achieve within the council's resources. "I know that when the County Library was proposed on Tower Street it was controversial, but now it is an admired part of the streetscape. It is rarely possible when designing a new building in Chichester to satisfy everyone's concerns, but the response of the South East Design Review Panel supports my own view that this is a building that we can be proud of."

Construction is due to start in early 2010 and it is hoped that the museum will open towards the end of Spring 2011.