Letter: Railway bridge re-build is needed
The plans to carry out refurbishment work on Castle Foregate railway bridge have come as a bit of a surprise.
However, it is pleasing to note that Railtrack consider Shrewsbury to be an important rail centre with an assured future.
What a pity that they cannot go further and demolish this creaking Victorian eyesore, which makes the approach to the town one of the worst and most off-putting in the country and replace both structures with pleasing open arches and traffic circulating below.
A few licks of paint on rusting steelwork and scrubbing the toilet-like tiling together with the council's proposal to spend £1.6m on 'improving' the Chester Street gyratory solves nothing and only pushes the problem further into town.
With the demise of the NWRR, this constant sticking plaster approach won't cure the patient and drastic surgery is the only remedy.
Visitors to Jersey will have been struck by the linking of the two halves of the island capital by an audacious road tunnel blasted through the solid rock below the citadel.
Economists say that the heavy construction industry needs big projects to create jobs and get us out of recession. What better place to start? If only Shrewsbury could be at the head of the queue.
Christopher Barff
Shrewsbury
