I have read with utter disgust the planning committee's reasons for destroying the Market Hall - part of my heritage, as a Boltonian born and bred.

There is going to be nothing left of Bolton. We are now going to be a plastic replica of every shopping mall in Britain.

Don't elected councillors take notice of the people who voted them in? What will be the next desecration of Bolton? Maybe the councillors would like to demolish the Crescent, the Town Hall or the Parish Church and replace them with pubs, clubs and another shopping mall.

We want to be different. A revamped Market Hall with the variety of small shopkeepers would have been the answer - not an imitation of the Trafford centre, the Arndale centre and Sheffield Meadowhall. They are all the same: same shops, same goods.

People came from miles around to go to the Market Hall because of the atmosphere and the stalls. Even when I visit Canada and say I am from Bolton, people say: "Is the Market Hall still the same? I loved to shop there."

What price change?

Patricia Morgan

Eskrick Street

Haliwell