I HAVE viewed the plans for a new school at Ponteland. It seems that there are many who are not aware of what is being proposed, nor the extraordinarily short consultation period before the decision is taken early in the new year.

The plans include a proposal to close Darras Hall First School and transfer the 450 pupils to the new, all-age campus located far outside the present village.

Currently many of these pupils are able to walk or cycle to school; under these proposals all these children will need to be taken to school.

Whatever happened to sustainable planning which dictates that facilities be built so that people can access them without recourse to vehicular travel?

To make matters worse, the new arrangements will mean that all the traffic generated by the 2,500 pupils will have to go out on to the A696 or B6545, rather than access directly from Darras Hall as the middle and high school do at present.

Can this possibly be regarded as good planning?

While no-one would disagree that Ponteland needs a new high school, surely the rational solution would be to rebuild on or near the current site.

The volume of extra traffic shouldn’t be underestimated; while many pupils currently attending Darras Hall First School will be eligible for bus travel, the idea that parents will be happy to put a four or five year-old on a bus to a complex where 2,500 youngsters up to 19 years old and hundreds of adult staff are arriving together, only goes to show that the men who run Northumberland County Council have no understanding of the safeguarding of children.

SARAH MCNULTY

Darras Hall

Ponteland