Tim Brown (Letters, February 28) articulated better than I ever could my feelings about Brighton's West Pier.

Why does the beauty of the frail old pier at sunset, with its murmuration of starlings sweeping and swooping, rank less as "heritage" than what will, in fact, be a redevelopment?

Why does the right of the people to the uninterrupted view of the sea they have had for generations count for less than someone's ambition to "renew" the pier?

To my mind, shops, burger bars and, most of all, the loss of that wonderful sweep of view is a price too high to pay for an ersatz new/old pier.

-Coun Joyce Edmond-Smith, Brighton and Hove City Council