IF LETTER writers to this newspaper are any indication, the Coppergate II proposals are welcomed by few people in York. After giving this matter some thought, which is to say the three minutes usually available for inspiration, this column has decided to come down fearlessly on the side of these letter writers.

This is not to be a detailed architectural summary of Coppergate II or a business-minded analysis of whether or not such a development would be good for York. I can't even claim to have looked at the plans for Son Of Coppergate as my eyes tend to glaze at the sight of such drawings. But I've read the stories in the Evening Press, and watched the letters come and go, and now the antis have my vote.

This is not to suggest support for the high-profile whingeing of the Stonegate Traders' Association, which objects to Coppergate The Sequel because, among other reasons, it will extend the linear pattern of shops in York, and shops in a line are apparently not so useful or profitable as shops in a circle, or some such. I would have thought York was small enough for all the shops to be within easy reach of each other, whatever pattern they adopt.

Besides, the Stonegate Traders' Association lose my vote for objecting to the living statue busker, whose stone-faced antics brighten up my lunchtime walks down Stonegate.

No, my reasons for opposing Coppergate Strikes Back are purely this: who needs any more shops in York?

The city is full of shops, stuffed with them, and where there are no shops, coffee bars barge in. You could absorb enough caffeine in this city to send your brain to Mars and back.

So the area around Clifford's Tower does not need another department store, or shops of any description, or more coffee bars or pubs (nothing against the last two, but there is only so much liquid a person can drink).

The preponderance of shops nowadays is an unhappy sign of modern life. Now I don't exactly mind shops, and I'll visit clothes shops or cookery shops on those fleeting days when all the money hasn't evaporated from our bank account.

But now no open space in this or any other city can be allowed to escape the erection of yet more chain-store shops, which all sell the same clothes in a stifling display of uniformity.

When did we start being defined by shopping? 'I shop therefore I am,' is the new creed, and while spending money can be uplifting, we have surely lost our way when shopping seems to have become the nation's favourite hobby.

With true imagination, the land around Clifford's Tower could become a green and pleasant open space, or perhaps the site of a dazzling modern glass building that enhances the tower, a reason to stand and gasp, or a place to sit and relax.

Any such daring or thoughtful use of this space would add to York, while Coppergate II would only add more shops.

An historical city such as York should always be more than the sum of its shops, shouldn't it?

THEY were distant, disputatious days. Everyone was on strike, journalists too. On my weekly paper in south east London, we took part in a variety of disputes in the early Eighties. One of the strangest was withdrawing our labour every Wednesday.

After a while, most people worked hard on a Tuesday to make up for the struck off day to come. This rather spoilt the point.

For some reason, this old futility is brought to mind by the daft Dump The Pumps protest.

Not buying petrol one day just to buy it the next seems a pointless act to me.

But then I lived through Don't Work Wednesdays.