Your letters September 24 - seafront shelters

What price innovation?

WE are all familiar with the word innovative; it is the word often used to persuade a reluctant audience to accept the crass, by suggesting they are Philistines if they do not.

So far we have had the innovative concrete balls, the innovative bandstand which won an award but sees little use, the innovative displays in the De la Warr Pavilion, the innovative design and planting of the new beds on the seafront, and finally the innovative design of the new windtunnels- sorry shelters- for the seafront offering little protection for the feet and legs and the rest of the body for that matter.

How refreshing to see that Cllr Winterbourne disapproves of the design and is willing to speak out.

As Dee Wilson-Perry said in her letter last week: "we need councillors who reflect the wishes of local people".

Eastbourne with its award-winning art gallery and beautiful seafront must be so glad that the members of the council in charge of of their affairs are perceptive and forward-looking rather than innovative.

What price innovation in Bexhill?

CAROLE WOODLAND

Cooden Drive

Bexhill

The garden sheds...

HAVING seen the photos of the new seafront shelter, I'm amazed they had to have a competition to design one.

Surely it would have been better (and cheaper) to go to one of our local garden shed/garage manufacturers (there's one on the way to Hastings) and they do a very good job.

Or is it a case yet again like the balls (up) in Devonshire Square - another memorial to egos.

HR Lloyd-Jones

Upper Sea Road

Bexhill.

Absolute disbelief

I AM sitting looking at the front page of last week's Observer in absolute disbelief.

The two pictures in no way depict a shelter. For a start they will neither shield or act as any sort of barrier against the winds and rain thrown at us during the winter months.

Look at them - they dont have one proper sheltering wall between them, great gaping gaps allowing all our elements like wind and rain to go hurtling through.

Also who wants to sit and enjoy? There's a joke on a bench with nothing to rest one's back on.

I ask you, who are these faceless people that think these enhance the seafront?

As for Sarah Gaventa's comments about Bexhill's tradition of hosting innovative and contemporary architecture, what planet is she on?