RAMSBOTTOM Heritage Society notes with alarm the threat to our town from further redevelopment.

Planning permission is continually being sought, often in the Conservation Area, to build totally inappropriate flats and apartments, three or four storeys high. The designs are not in keeping with surrounding properties, many of which are 19th and early 20th century stone cottages.

Apart from these aesthetic considerations, this type of housing will generate ever more cars to jam up the already overcrowded main roads in the town. Even without any further building, it is easy to see that the night and morning rush-hour log jams are extending much further during the day and evening.

The questions have to be asked: what plans, if any, has the local authority borough engineer to alleviate this terrible and rapidly growing problem? What part is the borough planning and economic development officer going to play when considering totally unsuitable planning applications on the lines already mentioned?

Ramsbottom has been described by a past mayor of Bury as "the emerald in the crown of the borough", which appears to have led to a mass rush to buy houses in the town. Surrounded as it is by green fields and hills, that statement is true, but the town is fast losing its character and amenities. There is now very little left relating to our industrial past, and our historic town is rapidly losing its identity.

In effect, greedy developers and others are killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. Unless the community wakes up quickly and makes its dismay apparent to the local authority, there will be no Ramsbottom left worth saving, an idea unbelievable to those who were born here and to anyone who knows and loves the town and its history.

The heritage society realises that it is impossible to live in the past, but pleads that any redevelopment be restrained and takes into account the historic significance of the area.

DOROTHY MOSS,

chairman,

Ramsbottom

Heritage Society.