Sir - Ted Dewan's crude and condescending depiction of opponents to the proposed blanket 20mph speed limit in Oxford as whingers (Letters, June 20) does little to advance his cause. What he does not mention is the many thousands of bus passengers whose journeys would be significantly lengthened by such a limit - people who live in Barton and Blackbird Leys, and park-and-ride users from the county towns who cannot afford to live in the verdant calm of Oxford's leafy inner suburbs.

Each working day for these people would be lengthened, and the time to relax with their families shortened.

I am reminded of the infamous Cutteslowe Walls episode. Here residents of the Cutteslowe council estate found their normal route to the Banbury Road bus stops blocked by a high wall built by the Urban Housing Company, builders of a private residential estate.

In 1935, it was claimed the walls added several extra hours to council estate workers and schoolchildren's journeys each week.

It was only after many years of protest by the residents, that doubtless Ted Dewan would have described as soiling their pants, that the walls were taken down.

I very much hope we will soon have enforced 20mph residential zones across the city.

But to introduce a blanket 20mph limit that so heavily penalises the less well-off is quite unacceptable.

Chris Brewer, Oxford