CUTTING through the bureaucratic complications in your article (New visitor centre would boost town, October 16), the town council is being asked to support Tavistock Forward in a feasibility study, to the tune of £5,000.

This is not necessarily the end of the request for financial support.

The study is concentrating on attracting finance, through some of the many agencies involved, to turn the police station and Guildhall into a mining museum.

Through all this haze, the simple question has to be asked — Do the people of Tavistock want a mining museum, and are they prepared to support the council in putting money into this project? I suggest there are more urgent priorities.

The claim that a museum focused on mining would quadruple visitor numbers is beyond belief.

Tavistock itself is a superb example of its mining heritage. It is the buildings, streets and markets, with the Duke on his pedestal, who made so much of it possible, facing down Plymouth Road past the Abbey ruins to Drake at the far end, that gives Tavistock its character. And it is the character of the town that attracts visitors and which makes us proud to live here.

If there is money available for the deep pockets of consultants, let it be spent in solving the traffic problem which is the greatest threat to Tavistock's continuing attraction. We need a comprehensive review and plan for the future management of Tavistock traffic that will force some action from the county council and make available adequate funds.

Around the town there is the ever-present danger of head on collisions in streets not wide enough to allow a row of kerbside parking, and normal two-way traffic. We need to consider schemes for road widening, increased car park capacity, park and ride schemes, one-way systems, traffic lights, under-road walkways and a town bus service.

Those of us who love this town resent its destruction by the increasing flow of traffic, and the total absence of planning, and want some action to save the situation. It may already be too late.

Peter Boyce

17 Tremayne Rise

Tavistock

I THINK it is a great pity that Councillor Alison Clish-Green evidently did not participate in the Tavistock Canal bicentenary celebrations held earlier this year (Forward wins bigger grant than proposed, Times, October 9).

Had she done so she would have seen that Tavistock Forward does indeed deliver — as witnessed by the 800-plus visitors who viewed the exhibition held in the Guides' Hall (now on view at Morwellham Quay), the 15 local schools which have received an educational pack, the 60 guests at the unveiling of the inscribed commemorative stone, the music fans attending Rock On and the Acoustic Café, visitors using the new Drake's Walk Guide, and the volunteers who have helped on three occasions to clean up parts of the canal.

All of these events were conceived, planned and organised by members of Tavistock Forward — at no direct expense to the town or borough councils.

It is a sad day when an elected representative appears to be so out of touch with the aspirations and efforts of the community which she claims to stand for.

In our democratic society there is of course a way of changing this situation — just as there is the annual opportunity for the said councillor, or indeed any member of the public, to stand for election to the executive of Tavistock Forward.

Simon O'Connor-Thompson

Chair

Tavistock Canal bicentenary working party