Tell me, where do the children play?

I HAVE watched with amazement how a new estate has been built right across the road from me over the last 10 or so years. Beautiful houses popping up everywhere with young families and children everywhere. It is so good to see them all.

But my question is, where are the playgrounds? Not one swing, not one slide, nothing other than a big hole in the ground to catch the water. Admittedly there is a great concrete path around the hole for walking or scooter riding etc, but come on.

Go to Armstrong Creek or the new estate at Fyansford and there is play equipment everywhere. Nothing but the best I might add, yet out here in the north not a single thing. Nothing, zip.

The city planners who approved this estate should hang their heads in shame. These children need something to play on, not just a hole in the ground.

Graham Rutherford, Corio

42BC

Battle of Philippi, second engagement; Brutus commits suicide.

1642

The first major conflict of the English Civil War takes place at the Battle of Edgehill between the Royalists under King Charles I and the Parliamentarians.

1739

Britain declares war on Spain. The conflict is called the War of Jenkins’ Ear, because of the alleged amputation of Captain Robert Jenkins’ ear by Spanish coastguards. 1789

Matthew

Flinders, adventurous at 15, joins the Royal Navy as a lieutenant’s servant aboard HMS Alert. 1823

Surveyor-general John Oxley leaves Sydney on the cutter Mermaid to examine Port Bowen, Port Curtis (Gladstone) and Moreton Bay. He is to examine the suggestion of a convict colony at Port Curtis. He will also examine the Tweed River and Brisbane River. 1917

Vladimir Lenin arrives in Russia from Finland to urge his Bolshevik comrades to seize power.

1942

The British, led by Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery (above), launch a successful infantry attack against the Germans, led by Rommel, at El-Alamein, Egypt. 1944

US forces led by Admiral William F. Halsey Jr, start a decisive air and sea battle against the Japanese on the central Philippine island of Leyte. The Japanese lose 34 ships. 1950

Al Jolson, the US vaudeville singer who called himself ”the world’s greatest entertainer’’, dies aged 64 in San Francisco.

1968

The first heart transplant in Australia is performed at St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney, led by Harry Windsor, on Richard Pye,

57. He survives six weeks. 1975

All 11 people aboard a Heron aircraft die when it crashes into trees while approaching Cairns airport during an electrical storm.