CHILDREN in two towns will benefit from £220,000-worth of improvements to play areas.

Council and Lottery grants go to Carterton's Kilkenny Lane Country Park, which will include a garden for children with sensory impairments, and natural landscape features such as mounds and tunnels as well as play equipment, and Chipping Norton recreation ground, which will get a new multi-games area and viewing shelter as well as better safety surfacing on the existing play area.

Work is expected to begin by the end of December.

Hilary Biles, cabinet member for leisure and tourism, said: "Both these schemes will help us meet our aim of providing leisure opportunities and promoting a healthy lifestyle for young people in west Oxfordshire."

The cabinet has also told officers to look into ways of setting up a play ranger service for overseeing areas in the district, which has also qualified for £50,000 Lottery funding.