Your letters page on May 18 highlights two issues: Filling a shop is good news, acknowledging times are tough and a shop filled is good news unless it’s a sex shop. The other is Jill Gunn’s letter on the destruction of the town’s beauty.

The views are correct – it is very hard to fill an empty shop, so the answer Bournemouth Council came up with is this: To build on car parks and have shops below (Madeira Road) and in the process for good measure pull down beautiful trees and then knock down public toilets – hardly in keeping with Jill Gunn’s beautiful town.

Today alone I have had three holidaymakers asking if they can use our toilets. The enterprising owner of the business I work for suggests I put the following sign in front of where toilets once stood: “Toilets closed – get your portable urinal from GE Bridge and Co Ltd accross the common”.

Mike Carlile, manager, GE Bridge and Co Ltd Old Christchurch Road Bournemouth