Sir – Sadly, there is really no way in which the Trap Grounds can be called a Town Green, although that is what we thought we were getting.

It is now designated by the city council, to whom the land belongs, as a nature reserve, this would be fine if they were run in a similar fashion to Peasmoor Nature Reserve and Magdalen Wood by Wood Farm estate.

These two areas have public paved paths running through them and are used on a regular basis by the general public.

Much of the nine acres of the Trap Grounds was a brownfield site, it used to have a builder’s yard on one side and assortment of sheds and a scrap merchant on the other side. The middle was overgrown and rather delightful, but used then, as it apparently still is, as it is so cut off, by ne’er-do-wells. Most people would not dream of going there by themselves because it is so cut off.

The Trap Grounds now lie between two new large estates, Waterways and Waterside. On Navigation Way, one is met by a 7ft fence and on Stone Meadows Road, a steep wired- off ditch, both dead ends, rather than there being a path joining them.

The only entrance/exit to the Trap Grounds is via the canal, not ideal for the primary schoolchildren of SS Phil & Jim or anyone else. It is shocking that this situation exists now in North Oxford, reviving memories of the infamous Cutteslowe Wall.

Catherine Robinson was quite right to protect the Trap Grounds from being built on, but it has become the domain of the Friends of the Trap Grounds, few local residents go there. A compromise would be if the Friends of the Trap Grounds continued to run the reed bed area.

The rest of the Trap Grounds could and should be run by the city council, as they do with Peasmoor and Magdalen Wood, for the good of the general public.

Rosanne Bostock, Oxford