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So much potential

Your double page article about Swindon town centre “a delight or desolate” got me thinking this morning on my commute along Canal walk and Bridge Street.

There are plenty of good things in town at the moment - the Crossing has great food, the hanging baskets are lovely and the Metro Bank is an improvement on the phone shop that was there before. However, it is true that Swindon town centre falls short of what is expected of a major regional hub.

I’m writing as a Swindonian, who would love more reasons to be enthusiastic about Swindon. Visitors to Swindon by train, expecting to see the heritage of Brunel’s railway town on exiting the train station and heading towards town, are affronted with a particularly sad part of town, with several empty beautiful old buildings (don’t get me started on the Mechanics Institute), enough to put them off visiting again. But why would they visit the town centre anyway? If it’s retail they’re after, wouldn’t they go to the Outlet Village?

Why is our town centre mainly a retail centre? This has made it vulnerable to changes in shoppers’ habits - internet shopping has damaged high streets across the country.

There should be more diverse service businesses in town too, whose employees could eat at the Crossing during their lunch hours seeing as it closes too early for anyone to eat dinner there - and these services would attract footfall (I don’t just mean services like insurance, I’m including health, education, the arts and sciences etc).

More than this, it is obvious that there needs to be a strong pull factor - an incentive - for people (locals and visitors) to visit Swindon town centre, beyond necessity.

The most far reaching change that should be made is to bring back the canal on Canal Walk. Perhaps it could be linked with the canal at Wichelstowe if enough thought, imagination and effort was applied.

Consider other local successful towns of similar size - Gloucester, Salisbury, Oxford, Bristol, Reading - they all have a body of water to attract people to spend time and money and enjoy their beautiful surroundings. It would encourage cafes, bars and restaurants along the waterfront, and give all of us Swindonians a reason to visit the town centre again, which, for example, the gambling shops, greasy takeaways and dodgy bars on Bridge Street aren’t doing for everyone now.

Swindon town centre should be mixed use, and attract people from all walks of life and for lots of different reasons in order to thrive. Swindon has a vibrant history of innovation and risk-taking, let’s apply the same to reinvigorating our town centre.

Lauren Wallis, Old Town

Invest in the town

I moved from Basingstoke to Swindon through work in 1991 and both town centres were comparable. Today I visited Basingstoke and was astonished at the town centre’s redevelopment.

All I can say is that Swindon’s is a slum by comparison and the thought of moving back to Basingstoke came to mind.

I also wondered how many people contemplating a new job would look and compare locations and I’m sure they would give Swindon the heave-ho. I know the only silver lining would be house price comparison.

If other towns can get big development or pension companies to invest quickly, what is the problem with Swindon?

Please don’t tell me, tell the council.

Dave Garmont, Swindon

As bad as each other

My fellow letter writer Martin Webb asks me to answer a very simple question – “How has Donald Trump earned my respect?” To which there is an equally simple answer. However, it’s first necessary to clarify the statement Martin claims I made on my Swindon 105.5 radio programme.

I stated that whatever one’s views of Donald Trump as a person, he deserved to be respected as the President of the United States. I have never met or spoken to Mr Trump but I don’t like him; I have the same feelings about Bill Clinton and Tony Blair.

Martin suggests Donald Trump should be thought badly of as he grabbed the genitals of a woman – I suppose having sex with an intern is okay and lying about it, just par for the course!

Showing support for racist organisations such as Britain First is indeed deplorable, whereas openly supporting terrorists like the IRA is okay on the basis that the Irish American vote is worth cultivating!

Donald Trump continued a policy of separating illegal immigrant parents from their children, a practice propagated by his two immediate predecessors and yet strangely there was never any outrage directed towards them!

Mr Trump endorses torture, well Martin so does the British Government, the difference is that our government (of both hues) has denied it, even to the point of accusing people like me of being serial conspiracists!

Dropping bombs and killing innocent civilians, well we did that too. What we did was tell the British people that a nasty Syrian president had gassed his people with Sarin, that justification has just been roundly rejected by the latest report which demonstrated that nothing of the kind occurred.

Finally, Martin suggests that Donald shows hatred towards Sadiq Khan the Mayor of London – in that I’m afraid I have to admit he may be right. But on the other hand let’s not get too carried away – the definition of hatred in the new lexicon of words can mean that any form of dislike or disapproval can be translated as a perceived hate statement, so perhaps on balance ‘The Donald’ isn’t any worse than any other politician in the world. Just a thought.

Des Morgan, Caraway Drive, Swindon