Letters to the Editor

"Traffic management? That's a laugh," I hear your readers say. "At times, it's been like Bedlam up there."

Well, I agree. After all I've spent 12 hours a day there for seven months. Everyone's under pressure: timetables to keep; jobs to go to; kids to get to school and taxis to drive.

But please, motorists, when your blood's boiling in the queue, remember the cones are there for a reason - usually to protect a workman but quite often to protect you from danger.

In the early hours of Saturday I was amazed to see cones and a big arrow being moved and a driver proceeding through as though nothing was amiss. A workman could have been in that closure. He wouldn't have stood a chance. There might have been a six-foot-deep trench to drive into. Then what?

We expect a bit of abuse; it goes with the job. But please remember we all want to spend Christmas with the kids.

Thanks to the local residents for being more than understanding, especially the Craven Heifer!

Andy Hodge, Allott Crescent, Jump, Barnsley.

SIR - I was pleased to see the lead the T&A is taking in cleaning up the litter in the district.

This encouragement is timely as the Council's efforts over the last couple of years have been impressive with first-class litter-picking and mechanical sweeping, and all it now needs is an awareness by every Bradfordian that they have a part to play as well because many of them drop the stuff in the first place.

Some of us make sure we never drop litter but we can do even more to show an example to those who drop packaging, cans, tickets and receipts. If we each picked up one item a day and binned it there would be less litter on the streets and the awareness that we can all help would be raised and it would be the start of the improvement we seek.

Councillor Keith Thomson (Independent, Wibsey), Heights Lane, Bradford.

SIR - After travelling around the Leeds Road area I was totally disgusted by what I saw: Rubbish was piled high, food boxes littered pavements and alongside one of the shops was a large skip piled with cardboard and refuse.

Bradford Council needs to act and serve notices on the owners of premises which constantly throw their rubbish out. In Bradford we have one of the best cleansing departments, but even they can only do so much.

Leeds Road is one of the main corridors into Bradford and, if all visitors see is rubbish, what hope have we of the new plans for the centre of the city bringing people and business in?

All the agencies need to pull together to make Bradford a place we can call home.

Brian R Harrison, St Margaret's Avenue, Holme Wood.

SIR - Last week it was our turn for the water mains in our street to be upgraded.

"How efficient," I thought when we received our notification stating our water would be cut off on October 21 and 22 for 34 hours, and advising us to store sufficient water, which we did.

Alas, all in vain, for Tuesday and Wednesday didn't really mean Tuesday and Wednesday, but Wednesday and Thursday. If I hadn't checked with the workmen we would have had no idea.

Their schedule stated the later two days and I'm still waiting for an explanation from Yorkshire Water as to why the mistake was made.

Storing water for two days was manageable but an unexpected third day meant carrying buckets of it from a portable tank and then upstairs.

Mrs M Baxter, Hoyle Court Road, Baildon.

A Yorkshire Water spokesman said: "We apologise for the inconvenience caused to the residents of Hoyle Court Road. This was caused due to an error in communication. This process is now under review to try to prevent any further repeat."

SIR - I do not believe the citizens of Bradford will take the proposed lake in the middle of the city seriously. It is a farce, a folly, but Will Alsop has achieved his objective. I also believe the Telegraph & Argus is in on the hoax.

It's just the emperor's new clothes. The courtiers ie all the people quoted in your supplement (October 27) are in my opinion afraid to say: "You're naked - you fool!"

The trouble is with the cabinet system running Bradford, the scheme could well get through. Effectively, the 17 members of the executive committee rule the roost.

So we could end up with a swamp in the middle of Bradford and even though most of the costs, we are told, will be paid by the private sector, we know that we, the ratepayers, will pay many millions also. And yet the Council can't afford to fund our old people's homes.

Bryan Russell, Heaton Crescent, Baildon.

SIR - Alan Titchmarsh calls the masterplan for Bradford "scary," but I have seen the exhibition in the former Dillon's bookstore and I call it absolutely fantastic.

Bradford's finest buildings standing among trees, reflected in a lake with a park in front. "Get on with it," I say.

However, what about the misery-guts who wrote to your letters page? Mrs M Cook doesn't think Bingley should be involved. I reckon Bradford could well do without Bingley.

Carl Gresham says he doesn't want to spend a penny. Neither did people 40 years ago and I remember the retired city architect commenting on the lousy concrete boxes we got round Forster Square. He said: "People get what they are willing to pay for."

As for the lake: If we can't keep it clean, we deserve the result. At the age of 76 and having lived in Bradford all my life, I say: "Stop talking, get cracking."

Jack Mawson, Grove House Crescent, Bradford 2.

SIR - After seeing your supplement, a Vision for Bradford (T&A, October 27), it is to be recommended that the residents of Bradford should visit the exhibition on Market Street and comment on the proposals.

The plan to restrict traffic passing through the city centre is welcomed and will improve the air quality but a shuttle service between the two railway stations would only suffice as an interim measure until a heavy rail link is built between them.

Now is an opportune moment for a rail corridor to be protected between the stations, so that a link can be built in the future!

Alec Suchi, Secretary, Bradford Rail Users Group, Allerton Road, Bradford.

SIR - How much I agree with Rachael Williams about the process surrounding the plans for a children's home at Netherlands Square, Low Moor (Letters, October 21).

This whole affair has been a complete and utter farce from the very beginning.

We have been knocked back at every turn and even ridiculed by Tory councillors during and after a speech made by my wife in front of council members on September 16. One even questioned the reason for us being there and went on to say we had already lost our fight.

The two so-called surgeries we attended were more like "this is what you are going to get, like it or lump it" sessions.

In my view, our opinions just fell on deaf ears.

Let's hope that the Council do go ahead and build the lake in the centre of the city and then we could have games like ducking stools and walking the plank with a constant flow of participants from over the road at City Hall.

P Mitchell, Netherlands Square, Low Moor.

SIR - The UK Independence Party now has 28 councillors. Three years ago UKIP contested 41 seats, last year it was more than 160 and this year that leapt to 470.

It has been small beginnings but then the long march starts with the first step, as someone once said.

Our Government, on our behalf, pays out £12 billion to the faceless ones in Brussels. Of this we get back roughly half but, on May 1, 2004, ten of the East European countries become full members of the EU; as they are not anywhere near as economically viable as the existing members it is a safe bet that our rebate, so hard won by Margaret Thatcher, will disappear rapidly in an easterly direction.

Also, our Government has magnanimously agreed to open our borders to ALL the citizens of these ten countries on the day they join; the remaining members of the 15 will not do so until 2013. So John Prescott is going to have to build a lot more houses than he thought.

S Hanson, Collier Lane, Baildon.