THE trouble with expensive transport schemes is they do enormous damage, both human and environmental, and yet within a few years congestion is as bad as ever, if not actually worse.

Looking at old photos of around 1900 – like those on Saturday (Echo July, 15) – you are amazed by the virtual absence of traffic or any sign therefore (apart from the numerous heaps of horse muck). Yet in 1900 we were a vastly richer, more powerful and independent country than we are now (what’s more there was no climate change problem).

Time for a basic rethink – about transport and much else.

Tony Kelly, Crook