THE Citizen is quite right to spearhead the campaign against the Northern link road - a route that cannot alleviate the problems on Morecambe Road and Greyhound bridge.

Nor, unfortunately, would the building of the (rejected) Western option. It would only shift the problem to the south of the river.

You cannot get a quart into a pint pot. To try to solve the gridlock by moving it to junction 33 of the M6 will seriously increase problems south of Lancaster University, problems highlighted in the parish plan consultation in Ellel.

Traffic speed was regarded as a major concern by the large number who responded to the questionnaire!

Efforts to alleviate these problems have already been made as a condition for the expansion of the university.

Peak hour congestion was so bad that gridlock extended along the A6 from Galgate to the roundabout at junction 33. Some of this was caused by traffic from the north to the university, using the M6 and approaching from the south.

As a result, drivers were tempted not to use the A6 and ended up on minor roads such as Hampson Lane and Stoney Lane.

Worse, Chapel Street, narrow and residential, received heavy traffic at a time when children and their parents were making their way to school.

Building a connection from Morecambe to junction 33 at Hampson can only make this and other problems, worse.

The points made in Marion McCaraith's excellent letter apply to all options, and to most road building. Why destroy beautiful countryside for no benefit?

Elsewhere in your letters was reference to climate change, and part of this is caused by traffic. Why must we always use motor vehicles? Because we do, as the lemmings said as they slid over the cliff edge.

Michael Helm, chairman, Lancaster Campaign to Protect Rural England.