Letter: AA's road to ruin

Sir: It is natural enough that Kenneth Faircloth of the Automobile Association (letter, 5 October) should wish to promote the building of more roads, but his gall in trying to claim that such a policy would be 'environmentally desirable' takes the breath away.

The effect would not be, as he claims, to cut congestion and hence cut emissions (does that follow?), but simply to increase the length of road on which congestion would occur. It should be obvious enough by now that traffic increases to fill the space available for it.

It is certainly true that individuals like the freedom that car ownership confers (I confess that I do myself), but the objective of a coherent government transport policy should be to wean them away from such anti-social habits by providing cheap and frequent public transport. The current massive emphasis on road transport - and particularly on cars - is at the expense of the health of future generations, and of this one.

It was sentiments such as Mr Faircloth's, emanating from both the AA and the RAC, that convinced me to join the Environmental Transport Association

instead.

Yours faithfully,

BILL LINTON

Bristol,

Avon

5 October