REGARDING the letter by Allan Ramsay about ever complaining motorists "Paying the price of car society".

I don't know if he is a driver himself, but he has a point.

As a boy in the 1960s, I saw the writing on the wall and, luckily, passed my test first time when driving tests were much more lenient. Driving up and down Beaumont Road and doing u-turns at each end was child's play, made easier as there were no traffic lights and it was still cobbled.

Of course, this idyllic mode of driving would be impossible today. But it needn't have been like this. This island -- Britain -- is far too over-populated, which causes other problems which dwarf the transport problems.

If the population was about, say, 10 million, we would have the driver's utopia advocated by Allan Ramsay. All these problems are being caused by demand. Remove this and we would have utopian driving conditions, not to mention cheap houses with views too, instead of developers swallowing up our green fields. We would have almost nil pollution, and bypasses would not have been necessary. The list of advantages would be endless. Alas, this would never be the case with a population of 60 million. I think this proves my point. Then, again, what of the future? From recent surveys, if true, we will be anchored into a European superstate subservient to their laws.

An alternative future could be brought on by our involvement with a war against Iraq.

R Howarth

Alexandria Drive

Westhoughton