Sir – It is not healthy for Oxford residents to have 40,000 students living amongst us. A recent study by Professor Dorling from Sheffield University has demonstrated that cities with large student populations, such as Oxford and Edinburgh, have a high index of mental health problems.

He argues that students are transient, with different life styles which mean that they have little input into their neighbourhoods.

This leads to a sense of fragmentation and disconnection for other residents who feel lonely and isolated, and experience feelings of suspiciousness and fearfulness.

There are a number of such socially fragmented neighbourhoods close to the main Brookes Gipsy Lane Campus; for example, the Valentia Road and Little Oxford estates which consist mainly of Houses of Multiple Occupation (HMOs) and are generally regarded as part of the Brookes campus.

In my own neighbourhood, the Divinity Road area, which is five minutes walk from Brookes, recent information indicates that ninety two houses (25 per cent of all residential accommodation) are occupied by students. The social disintegration of our neighbourhoods is unacceptable.

We are in an era when healthy local communities are vital if we are to find solutions to the increasing rates of loneliness and depression, and to working out the huge behavioural changes which a necessary low carbon lifestyle will bring about.

Brookes labels local residents’ criticism of their expansionist plans as coming from “a vocal East Oxford minority”.

Regretfully this has a ring of truth as many of us now live in neighbourhoods where (especially late at night) permanent residents are clearly in a vocal minority.

At least the letter from Jon Snow et al acknowledges that the signatories live well away from Brookes, I suspect that the others writing in support of Brookes may be in the same situation.

Sietske Boeles, Oxford