Old Odeon would be a great theatre

With reference to your article ‘Council drops plans for bingo hall’ (KE, November 11), I had to read this twice to let the fact sink in that our council had plans at one time to demolish an Art Deco building and replace it with shops.

Ashford could do with a theatre and what better building could we have had for it than the old Odeon. How many people remember the large function room upstairs at the front of the building? I have happy memories of attending many functions there.

I can only dream of this happening as I can’t believe that this idea would ever have entered the heads of our current council leaders, given their past record of ‘if it’s old, knock it down’.

Having lived in Ashford for around the past 50 years we have seen so many mistakes made by the councils of the day, and sadly it still goes on and will do until we are blessed by a group of people running the town who have our welfare at heart and don’t suffer from ideas of grandeur. C J Chamberlain Cradlebridge Drive, Ashford

My son took me by car, there is a free car park opposite the surgery, and I was back home at 10.30am. I have nothing but praise for the staff who were very pleasant and helpful.

My appointment for the operation was at 10am the following day (Sunday) and I was back home by 11.30am after a very successful operation. What a wonderful service!

The New Hayesbank Surgery is a new building which has been open one year for just cataract operations at weekends. On weekdays it is a doctor’s surgery. Alan F. Taylor Folkestone

The council’s bid for the Mecca Bingo site was unsuccessful