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Park in your own road

I READ with interest about the parking problems in Bowood Road.

This is a major concern for about every road, cul de sac, street, avenue and close in Swindon, mainly driven by people who don’t actually live in the said street, road etc.

They are parking in another street because again others are parking in their street, road etc. It’s a vicious circle of non residents parking forcing residents out of their own street.

For issues like this permit parking should be enforced to allow home owners to park up in the same place as they live.

If you live in Bowood Road you should be allowed to apply to the council for a parking permit with your road name clearly on the permit.

If you don’t live in Bowood Road you don’t park there. If you do park without a permit the vehicle gets towed away and you pay the fine to get it out of the car pound.

If every street had its own permits outsiders would have no need to park in the next street.

The council will need to make a charge for the permits but hey ho, I would pay say a tenner a year for the privilege of parking outside my house and not have to get stressed out after a long day at the coal face winding myself up thinking, ‘will I get a space tonight or do I have park streets away?

One last minor thing is make it two permits per household, road or street space allowing, if you have more than that you’re not being neighbour friendly.

JOHN L CROOK, Haydon Wick, Swindon

Follow Ulster’s lead

IT STRIKES me that elected MPs are supposed to represent the people of the constituency who voted them in. If this is the case might I suggest that ten of our worthy West Country Tories gang together and threaten to renounce the whip unless their constituencies receive £1.1bn of additional funding.

It seems to work for Ulster, so there is no reason why it shouldn’t work here. Or do these MPs not represent our interests?

JIM CROTON, Derwent Drive, Stratton, Swindon

Idea still steams along

IN 1781 the Scottish engineer James Watt patented the first steam engine that produced a continuous rotary motion. And 236 years later all of the power stations in Britain still use a steam engines to generate electricity.

The source of heat can be coal, oil, gas or nuclear but the electricity is still generated by a steam engine.

I am sure that James Watt never dreamed that we would still be using his ideas more than 200 years later. It is amazing that such a low tech idea as the humble steam engine should still be in common use in 2017.

STEVE HALDEN, Beaufort Gree,n Swindon

Is it in the genes?

IS ADAM Poole related to King Canute?

M COOPER, Basset Down