THE point that Mrs Portman missed ? or declined to accept ? in her commentary (Letters, October 18) on my letter is that a public road is open to all of the public; were it not so, the road would be less than public. Ergo, it would be more private, the greater for her benefit than that generality of the public less entitled (in her view) than she to the use of it. That is my general complaint against those who deploy the term ?rat-run? to denigrate those who lawfully use a public road that the denigrators would prefer to be more-or-less privatised for their greater convenience, albeit maintained at the expense of a public wider than they themselves. Several surveys by County Highways engineers have determined that, contrary to popular misconception, traffic along the Whitchurch Road does not ?speed? to any significant extent. Mrs Portman has adduced no cogent efidence to refute that finding of fact, yet she asserts the contrary by innuendo. Denigrating motor transport, on all manner of more or less flimsy pretexts, is currently fashionable. That does not make it either right or justified to do so. Were it not for motorised traffic, it is highly unlikely that tarmacadam would have been developed; moreover, without the exorbitant revenues exacted from motorists, it is even more unlikely that tarmacadam surfaces would be widespread. I wonder how many of the motor car?s detractors would be content in the 21st century to paddle through the mud or push their infants? perambulators across the cobbles characteristic of 18th century roads and streets. Few, I think. It is the closure of locally-used alternative routes and deterrent partial closures such as the Grenofen Gateway that impel increased use of and concomitant pressure on those parts of the network that remain. The public?s right to use public roads maintained at public expense is the issue. Irrelevant emotional claptrap larded with offensively pejorative phrases like ?rat-run? are but an unhelpful smokescreen, obfuscating the need for increased road capacity overall, greater resilience within the existing network and a renewed effort to constrain disruption on critical sections of the network to time periods when traffic is light. Roger W Mathew Willowby Down Road Tavistock