HERE was a worrying contrast between the Yes and No articles you published last week in answer to the question ‘Should the West Way redevelopment be given approval?’ Chris Church for the ‘No’ campaign, set out cogently and concisely why there is strong local opposition to the Doric scheme: out-of-scale buildings in a residential area; underestimated traffic growth; parking problems; incompatibility with the Vale local plan; destruction of local architecture; impact on local traders.

Whether or not one agrees with these points, they are specific concerns and deserve a response.

For the ‘Yes’ side, Matt Barber offered generalities but little substance. He did not deal with a single one of the issues set out by Mr Church, seeming more concerned to knock down an Aunt Sally about throwing elderly residents and disabled people out on to the streets – an idiotic claim that I don’t believe anyone has made seriously.

The real worry is the implication that the Vale council have already acquiesced to the Doric project, even though wholesale redevelopment of Botley on the proposed scale is not part of the local plan. If it is only “getting the details right” (Councillor Barber’s words) that has to be done, where is the council’s impartiality as planning authority?

This is not a decision that can safely be left with the Vale.

HOWARD EMMENS, Arnolds Way, Oxford