WHEN I was young, the London to the West road (A40) went through the centre of Oxford.

In the late 1930s a relief road was built to the north of Oxford to take the through traffic.

As so often happens, a new road becomes a convenient area to surround with houses and that’s what happened with the Northern Bypass – the first serious mistake being the building of Barton East.

For a start, it’s clearly the case that another relief road is needed to the north of the present one. But, even if a new road was built, it will not provide a cure for the congestion caused by local traffic movements.

It’s therefore imperative that every other option is explored to get local people from A to B without them having to resort to cars.

In the long term, one would anticipate that fuel supplies will start to run out, making filling a car too costly for its use to be practicable.

Unfortunately, as a result of this burning of more fossil fuel, further damage will be done to the environment, resulting in weather conditions even worse than the ones we now have to endure.

If the number of cars is reduced, how great it will be to, once more, see our roads clear of parked cars.

But, for the time being, we must accept that the petrol companies will not stop until they have extracted every last drop of hydrocarbon from the soil.

DERRICK HOLT, Fortnam Close, Headington, Oxford