EASTBOURNE ACADEMY: NEWS that Eastbourne Academy, Darlington, is unlikely be built at the town's Tommy Crooks Park yet again fully justifies the Share (Share Hurworth and Rural Education group) position during the campaign to save Hurworth School.

Time and again it was illustrated that this site was unsuitable for a school, due to congestion and the huge infrastructure costs involved.

It is interesting to see the about-face of Darlington Borough Council now that it has to foot the bill for these costs themselves, rather than central government.

We now have ended up with a proposal which is exactly that put forward by Share all those months ago.

What a shame so much effort and money has been wasted, and so much hurt created by the council in the meantime.

Let us hope that with these lessons learned, a commitment to the future of Hurworth School can be made with significant levels of investment to the benefit of young people from every ward in the borough. - Ian Holme, Hurworth.

DOLPHIN CENTRE

I VISITED the Dolphin Centre at its re-opening in order to view whether the piece of black masking tape still covered the wall between the swimming area and new wet change area since August. It did.

Also upon entering the latest, vibrant reception area I happened to trip up a step that had no warnings whatsoever.

At a cost of £5m I would expect at the re-opening for there not to be any snagging to be completed.

I can't wait to see what appears when the barriers are removed covering the Pedestrian Heart scheme. - Ian Scott, Darlington.