Sir – I’m continually amazed at this wholly unjustified fuss about Frideswide. The present situation is about as good as you can get, roundabouts will solve nothing, cost more scarce money, and cause far more trouble/danger for all users than presently exists. I’ve cycled, walked and driven through this from all directions at most times of day and without splitting levels of traffic vertically in some futuristic da Vincian scheme, I reckon it’s as good as it gets.

Who complains most and why? For a “city” as small as this to have only one seriously crowded junction while coping with such large amounts of traffic of all types, the people of Oxford are lucky.

Most users that complain, I would guess, suffer from impatience at having to wait their turn for lights to change. They should live in some other real-size cities and think themselves lucky.

The only way to reduce traffic in the square is to hive it off before it arrives, make the ring road three lanes where most used, think “outside the box (square)” eg. make Roger Dudman Way behind the station a one-way, one-lane roadway crossing Castle Mill Stream alongside the railway to join Walton Well Road. This would solely be traffic wishing to get to North Oxford by turning left before reaching Botley Road railway bridge.

Imagine how much traffic would not have to use Hythe Bridge Street and the shorter queues on Botley Road. If it became a “rat run” so be it. The car parking charge farce has revealed Oxford’s continuing folly (and indeed the whole country’s) of not embracing the car properly.

John A. Mills Farmoor