THE Green Belt (Letters, January 18) is an outdated idea and does not work. When a city gets too big the belt has to be slackened off and we get a circle of development. Successive circles impede travel out of the city and stop air flow which removes pollution.

What we need is protected green corridors and wedges that run into the city from the countryside affording travel by people (on foot or bike), by wildlife and air flow into the centre.

York has this basic framework presently and its important to protect these wedges and corridors - the strays, parks, cemetery, playing fields etc. They can be seen as potential development land by philistines who only see land as money waiting to happen.

The countryside end of our wedges needs protecting to stop it being "cut off" from the open land. By all means do this, but some development then has to be allowed between the corridors/wedges so the city can grow without too much pain.

We need a new planning law to allow this to happen. Mnster, our twin city in Germany, has such a law and plans and has had since the Sixties. Go there if you can and see what a difference it makes to the health and feel of the city.

Bill Shaw,

St Olave's Road,

York.

Updated: 11:02 Tuesday, February 06, 2001