IN reply to your request for opinions on the parking situation at York Hospital (September 17), I think building a multi-storey car park and the need for a temporary park while it is being built at the hospital, is the wrong approach.

As David Merrett put it so clearly and sensibly at the council meeting, it is seriously inappropriate to be bringing more cars into the centre of York, which is already over-congested, and towards Gillygate which has the worst air pollution in the city.

I am sure there are many workers at the hospital who would approve of using a Park And Ride from Clifton Moor, which could be put into use almost immediately, and using the railway line to the new station at the hospital, a proposal for the future.

For those who still want to travel the whole way in by car, I feel they must be prepared to adapt to what must be the way of the future.

It is the only way York can be maintained as a pleasant place in which to live without worsening air pollution and grid-locking city traffic.

Helen Wright,

Grosvenor Terrace,

York.

...IN response to the story "Hospital parking scheme attacked" (September 17), the answer to most problems is a simple one.

Reserve 158 spaces in Union Terrace car park for hospital use while the multi-storey car park is being built - provided a realistic penalty clause for completion is incorporated, something City of York Council seem reluctant to do.

C P Hird,

York Road,

Haxby, York.

Updated: 10:42 Monday, September 22, 2003