A NEW £4m training centre will be built on a Spennymoor business park as part of a college relocation scheme.

Durham County Council is to move education facilities from Neville's Cross College to the Green Lane Industrial Estate in the town.

The scheme will see around 100 jobs transferred to the town and up to 300 visitors using the centre on training days.

The existing college, on the outskirts of Durham City, is to move to new buildings at Framwellgate Moor, to make way for housing, offices and leisure facilities.

Some of the buildings are currently used by the County Council as a management development centre, education psychologists office and a Sci-Tech Centre for IT teacher training.

These departments are all to be grouped together in a new two-storey office building on the south east of the estate, on land at the corner of Enterprise Way and Butchers Race.

The development has been welcomed by Sedgefield Borough Council's cabinet member for regeneration, Coun Kester Noble.

He hopes it will be a boost for the borough, which has lost more than 1,000 manufacturing jobs in the last year, including major job cuts at the nearby Black and Decker plant.

Coun Noble said: "It will be a welcome addition to the Green Lane site and a good start in what will hopefully be a wave of investment on the estate to attract new enterprise.

"Although they are not new jobs, relocating to an area which has suffered recently will be a positive thing as it may bring additional employment opportunities for local people in the future."

Construction work could start as soon as the end of this month and is expected to be completed by August 2004 and occupied the following month, in time for developers to move on to the Neville's Cross site.

The building is to be of a contemporary design, with curved metal roofs and internal glass walls, and along with the training rooms will include a diner.

About 240 car parking spaces are proposed and an access route will be created off Enterprise Way.