I TRY to make out the mentality of A Semple (letters, April 19). Has (s)he tried breathing in the town centre lately, or does (s)he never step outside the safety of an air-filtered car until safely back in whichever leafy suburb (s)he inhabits?

If the council is broke, but intend to give owners of electric cars free passage over the Itchen Bridge, to encourage cleaner private transport in the city, they can always put an added toll on diesel vehicles to make up any loss. But the greatest damage to ‘our disgraceful pot-holed roads’ is not caused by cars of any kind, so much as heavy freight vehicles with multiple tyres. We might wish that more goods were transported by rail, not road, freight.

Semple complains that ‘The tax we pay to use the roads was supposed to be used to keep them in a safe condition’. We all know this has not been the case for decades, but are our roads, in their present, pot-holed state, actually unsafe? Or do they simply slow down vehicles to a safer speed?

As a motorist myself (and a diesel car owner at that), my only major concern is that a pothole, where there is no cycle lane, may cause a cyclist to lose control and wobble in front of oncoming vehicles.

I appreciate Semple’s concern that city centre traders are having a tough time with high business rates, but (s)he is forgetting that central, not local, government, is responsible for forcing rate increases due to a 60% cutback of central government funding to local councils since 2010. Someone should also undertake a study of how internet trading, not traffic restriction, is killing local shops, and what the carbon footprint of e-commerce deliveries is like compared to traditional urban customer footfall.

A periodic ban on cars in the city centre isn’t going to be the end of the world. It has worked well in other large cities, in reducing atmospheric pollution and the number of consequent illnesses, with their resultant economic and social costs – but again Semple is ignoring the major villain as far as Southampton’s illegally high pollution level is concerned: cruise liners, keeping their engines running as long as they are in port. We should be providing electric power hookups for these huge vessels, and expecting them to pay accordingly. They can pass that on to their passengers, who can surely afford it.

One thing I can agree with Semple on: high student numbers are not good for the civic income, as they and their HMO landlords pay no council tax even though they use council services – but here again, it is central, not local government, that is to blame.

Nick Ford

Portswood