A thank you to Roger French for clearly reminding us why the A259 bus lanes were proposed and of their value to the city’s economy and environment as more passengers are able to get to work more quickly with less pollution (Letters, August 18).

As usual, Tory council leader Mary Mears seeks to blame her administration’s inept implementation of the scheme on the previous Labour administration while neatly forgetting that if she was indeed so opposed to it, she had the power to defer or even stop the scheme while reviewing the detail. As it was, with the council under Conservative control, her councillors voted the scheme through but then adopted a ‘hands-off’ approach to its implementation which directly led to many of the problems.

Managing traffic flow through effective transport planning in Brighton and Hove is a key priority if we are to continue to attract visitors and investors to a city that can breathe and where the creation of good quality public open spaces takes precedence over encouraging more and more vehicles to congest the streets. There must be a clear sense of direction and leadership.

Sadly, with their £4 million cut to the city’s Sustainable Transport Plan that would have created just such an improvement in the Air Quality Action Zone right in the heart of the city at Valley Gardens and their talk of several “park and ride” sites within the city itself, it is clear that the Conservatives pay no heed to the need to reduce pollution and effectively have no coherent transport policies to take this city forward.

Councillor Gill Mitchell Leader of the Labour Group Brighton and Hove City Council