ABOUT 30 years ago the then Labour council employed an outside agency called Touche Ross to point out the blatantly obvious: that York was an iconic destination and should be marketed on the basis of quality, not quantity.

I shudder to think what Touche Ross would have made of the York I saw one early morning recently.

Commencing in Piccadilly we have an example of civic vandalism of the highest (make that lowest) order, namely a tin can shopping mall with just enough graffiti to take your eye off the rust and gas cylinders.

Walking the pavements was like “tiptoe through the tulips”, the pavements resembling as they did sticky fly-paper.

It was a question of ‘Careful, don’t put yer foot in that!’.

Had I missed the regional heats of the projectile vomiting competition?

I then passed on to, oh dear, Coney Street. Once the retail hub of York, this is now a sad spectacle.

York has got the Shambles. Now it has also got shabby chic.

Chuck in a proposed chip shop in Parliament Street and York really has touched base.

It’s not good enough to tempt visitors to York and then base the cleaning regime on hoping that torrential rain will do the job.

And please, no more comments in The Press that it’s not so bad because somewhere else is worse.

It’s just not good enough.

Geoffrey Searstone,

Moor Lane, York