A NEW multi-million pound college is on schedule to be completed this summer.

Equipment and staff at Darlington College will be transferred to the £34.5m site, in Haughton Road, in June and July.

The college is expecting to pay about £100,000 to have its contents moved from its sites in Cleveland Avenue and Larchfield Street in the town.

Sarah Robinson, college principal and chief executive, said: "It is really exciting to see it all, and it should be operational from August.

"A lot of people don't think it is going to be ready in time, but it will be and we are going to have a series of open events in August."

The public will be able to tour the new building, including the library and sport facilities, which will be opened to the local community.

Ms Robinson praised Shepherd Construction for ensuring the college had been built to schedule.

"Shepherd have been very committed to ensuring we stick to the programme. There has been more than one contractor on the site at any one time and Shepherd have been first class in ensuring we overcame any problems," she said.

The move to Haughton Road - in a corner of the new Central Park development site - has been funded partially through the £11m sale of the college's existing sites.

The main site, in Cleveland Avenue, has been sold to executive housing developer Charles Church and the smaller Larchfield Street site, to developer McCarthy and Stone. The existing buildings will be demolished.

In addition to this windfall, the Learning and Skills Council gave the college £14m towards the move. The rest is being funded through a loan.

Central Park will stretch across 30 hectares and will include about 600 homes, a hotel and conference centre, shops and offices, a doctors' surgery, play areas and car parking.

Ms Robinson said the new college, along with the new Education Village in Haughton, the revamp of the Dolphin Centre and the Arts Centre, and investment in two Darlington secondary schools, would mean the town had some of the best facilities in the country.

She said: "Darlington is a very exciting place to be with all this development. People ask why there is so much money being invested in the town and it is because we all work so closely with the local authority."