Oxford's High Street used to be one of the loveliest streets in Europe. Today, it endures more buses per hour (well over 100) than it has Grade I listed buildings.

High Street is a disgrace, the most unpleasant road in the city with the possible exception of the infamous Botley Road railway underpass.

How on Earth have we managed to turn this gem into a cacophonous monument to public transport?

It's down to a lack of vision. The council's transport mantra is "access to Oxford", but no-one will want access if all you can see of a dreaming spire is obscured by a wall of buses.

Stuff the £3.75m hamburger' roundabout in Headington. Whether you live in the city or you're coming in from outside, the priority has got to be find and fund proper alternatives for the bus-strangled city centre.

Don't get me wrong - I've got nothing against buses. Public transport and bikes are both essential alternatives to the car. I just have a lot against buses in High Street, which is paralysed by their oppressive bulk and the ear-splitting groan of their engines. Enough is enough.

It is imperative that we stop buses using High Street. High Priority', a campaign by High Street Business Association to return High Street to people, is a step in the right direction. Imagine cycling or walking along a peaceful High Street, actually able to speak to the person cycling next to you, or walk two abreast.

Shopping and tourism could again become a pleasure, not a chore. Any other self-respecting city in the world would have sorted this out decades ago. In Oxford, it isn't only the architecture that's a relic from the dark ages.

High Priority wants airport and inter-city buses to operate from the park-and-rides, which isn't a great idea. The problem is, journeys to London would be more complicated and travellers would use cars instead.

What we actually need is buses (local and the London ones) to drop off and pick up at four points on the edge of the central core, with passengers transferring to a quiet light-tram shuttle service - or guided electric buses - to complete their journey to Carfax.

All bus passengers would transfer to trams at the Plain, Oxpens, the station junction and the north end of St Giles. A cruciform tram system would give us a safe, quiet city centre which encourages walking and cycling.

I suspect the bus companies would be delighted not to have to endure the crowded city centre, but a lack of bus-turning space means a tram/shuttle system won't work. I have a suggestion.

To create a bus-turning place at the Plain, would the college which owns that ugly '60s accommodation block next to Angel and Greyhound Meadow please volunteer the building for euthanasia?

Similarly, let's raze the six-storey building at the bottom of Banbury Road - the one that looks like an aircraft control tower - to provide a St Giles bus-turning area. See? With a few compulsory purchase orders, we can leave the city centre for cyclists and pedestrians.