WORK has started on the last stage of a project to improve an unsightly area on Hartlepool's Headland.

A green space is being created where there was previously a block of mainly empty, boarded-up houses.

The 20 semi-detached houses, at one end of Earl Street, were old and there was no demand for them, so they were demolished last year after consultation with residents.

Now work is under way to create a grassed area, as well as to build boundary walls for houses in Howard Street and Marine Drive, which back on to it.

The project has been funded by Hartlepool Borough Council, which owned most of the houses, and the North Hartlepool Single Regeneration Budget Partnership.

It is expected to take three months and will include converting the redundant strip of road into a pathway.

Project manager Sandra Twidale said: "People living in the immediate area were not happy living next to a number of old houses which had stood empty for some time and were virtually impossible to let."