I HAVE been reading articles about improvements' to our local roads and services carried out with the approval of our very experienced expert',the local council.

This council has a bad track record when it comes to successfully completing and getting things right first time.

The latest adventure is at least the third attempt to solve the Whitebirk roundabout debacle. If this roundabout had been designed right in the first place, all this work and expense would have been avoided.

Blackburn with Darwen Council seems to think putting the bulk of heavy traffic through one limited junction or chicane will improve flow.

And at the other side of the town centre, putting the bulk of traffic under the iron railway bridge on Darwen Street with very limited alternative escape routes was a guaranteed to create chaos!

Similarly, putting all the traffic going out onto Whitebirk, the ring road and the M65 at junction six on one badly designed roundabout was a similar mistake.

Installing traffic lights and doing a limited amount of remedial work to a badly designed junction will not cure the problem. It will still be a bottleneck.

The council says traffic lights would make the roundabout safer and get drivers off the M65 quicker. I assume this refers to the slip road off the motorway from Preston which is the only one I know that has one lane to. All others have at least two lanes. Enough said about logical planning.

The cure for this problem would be to make this slip road two lanes all the way to the roundabout with a third lane to the left from about one third of the way from the motorway running away from the other two lanes and heading left towards the McDonald's outlet directly onto the Red Lion roundabout slip road. This would take all Blackburn-bound traffic off the large roundabout.

The spending of £2million on alterations which won't remove problems which will still be there after completion of the scheme.

MR T GRIMSHAW, Darwen.