LAST week cycling in to work in the morning was almost a breeze, with very little traffic. This week traffic was backed up from Skeldergate Bridge to beyond The Winning Post pub on Bishopthorpe Road.

Why? Because last week was half term. This week parents are back to driving their offspring to school to protect them from the dangers of the traffic much of which will be made up of other parents driving their children to school.

I would suggest the city council reduces the minimum distance for free bus transport for school children from three miles to two miles. But given the pathetic state of bus transport in York, I expect the exercise to have a minimal effect.

If York had a public bus system with a comprehensive network of radial and circular routes, frequent buses (no more than a quarter hour wait), services which continued into the evenings and Sundays, stops with timetable and route information, reasonable fares, a central bus station for rapid interchange and information, and integration with the railway, then people might actually feel that the bus was a viable option for travel within York and its environs.

Dr Duncan Campbell,

Albemarle Road, York.