AS we used to say when I worked for the parks department, felling trees is winter’s work.

The West End of Darlington is very attractive because of the large number of trees, along with the architecture of the buildings, among other factors.

The East End, regrettably, is not so blessed.

Since there are so few trees in the East End can someone explain why it is necessary to remove those outside Darlington magistrates court at this particular moment in time?

The management of trees is important.

Sometimes, of course, it is appropriate to cut them down.

At one time, we had a special trees officer in Darlington who made residents all over the West End keep all kinds of trees on their property – whether they liked it or not.

I wonder if we still do have a tree officer in these difficult times?

What an irony it is that the local authority seem to remove trees quite so casually.

West End residents have even been prevented from felling sometimes modern 30-year-old fast-growing hybrid conifers on their own land because someone in the past put a tree preservation randomly upon it.

It seems to me the East End has far too few trees to begin with and I would question the need for those outside the magistrates court to be felled at this point in time.

Nigel F Boddy, Darlington.