I WAS very pleased to read in the Daily Echo of the initiative taken by Cllr Stanley-Watts with regard to preserving Bournemouth’s environmental heritage.

Beauty, as we know, is in the eye of the beholder and it is not just the birds and the bees that have an impact on the environment.

Quite how he equates “environmental heritage” with the seemingly continuous granting of planning consent for high-rise accommodation blocks, cinema and restaurant complexes, and those ugly little concrete food bunkers in the Gardens is at best questionable.

Add to that the derelict demolition sites (ironically the best areas for wildlife to exist in urban areas) the vast number of uncared for and run down buildings all over the town, and the only too frequent sight of drunks ‘asleep’ on benches, scattered around Boscombe in the middle of the afternoon and it would seem that there is a long way to go before we have flocks of little birdies eating out of the palms of our hands.

Also, Cllr Watts, I don’t know how long you have lived in Bournemouth, but we are not a “Garden City”. Look at the constitution. We are a town.

GEOFF COOPER, Methuen Road, Bournemouth