Concerning the Goldsmid residents' meeting at Davigdor School, Russell Hicks is naive in thinking local people won't think about the impact of the proposed parking scheme from the perspective of their own pockets.

However, my understanding of the great bulk of the contributions made by residents such as myself is that we share many of the concerns of the Campaign for a Better Brighton.

We are concerned about the amount of car use in Brighton and Hove and are quite willing to use our own vehicles less wherever possible. We are also concerned about the appallingly dangerous parking in our streets.

If decriminalisation of parking and the introduction of controlled parking into the area is a way of improving the quality of all our lives, then we will support it.

Nonetheless, the purpose of this meeting was to demonstrate our fears about parking proposals which will not achieve this.

lnstead, they actively encourage employees of large local businesses to continue driving to work, parking dangerously and continue the trend of changing the area's character from a safe, residential place to live into part of the expanding town centres of Brighton and Hove.

Furthermore, these plans are asking local residents to subsidise this process!

Why should residents pay £80 per vehicle per year on top of their already relatively high council tax and get nothing in return, while commuters are asked to pay long-term parking fees currently between one-third and one-quarter of the going rate for all-day off street parking in central Brighton?

Instead of criticising selfishness which does not exist, Mr Hicks should be more proactive in negotiating incentives which actively discourage single-occupancy commuting.

That was what this meeting was about and that was why I made tentative suggestions for an alternative plan.

-O. Perkins, Address supplied