WHAT will the LibDems come up with next? Without offering a plan of any kind the local LibDem MSP asks Transport Scotland to consider reopening the Forth Road Bridge to traffic other than buses (Queensferry Crossing speed limit may be raised early in bid to ease congestion, The National, September 13).
The opportunities to reduce congestion are extremely limited and would probably increase the chaos.
For a start access to the Forth Road Bridge from the A90/M90 can not really be reopened as traffic would somehow have to make a right turn across traffic from the Queensferry Crossing on the A90/M90 to reach the Forth Road Bridge.
North-bound traffic could come off the A90/M90 at the Queensferry Crossing interchange roundabout and return to the Forth Road Bridge along the A904 to the Echline roundabout, but having driven all the way to the Queensferry Crossing this would probably be a waste of time.
North-bound traffic from Edinburgh only could also be allowed to come off the A90 using the bus lane to the Kirkliston road then through the Tesco and Echline roundabouts to the Forth Road Bridge.
South-bound traffic from the Forth Road Bridge could join the A90/M90 via the Echline and Queensferry Crossing interchange roundabouts for the A90, M8 and M9 or go via the Tesco roundabout and use the bus lane on the Kirkliston road to join the A90 to Edinburgh.
The situation at the Fife side would be even more chaotic as traffic to and from the Forth Road Bridge would have to share the ferrytoll interchange with local and Queensferry Crossing traffic.The resultant chaos on both sides of the river would exceed anything seen so far.
Maybe it would be better to wait a few weeks until the number of visitors to see the Queensferry Crossing falls away and drivers get used to the new layout before making any changes other than the proposed raising of the speed limit. After all this is nothing new to the people in South Queensferry who have lived with congestion and regular gridlock for many years and expected a period of congestion and chaos when the new road layout came into use.
John Jamieson
South Queensferry, West Lothian
NOBODY could be failed to be moved by the plight of the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar (Burma) (Myanmar crisis divides the world, The National, September 13).
Some 370,000 have fled Rakhine State for Bangladesh since the outbreak of violence last month, with whole villages being burned down and the Government accused by the UN of ethnic cleansing. Given reports of beheadings, rape and children being deliberately shot, it rather begs the question of why the UK Government, our government, continues to train the Burmese military, a task which cost the UK around £305,000 last year.
Based on reports from the UN, human rights organisations and Rohingya organisations, we are witnessing human rights violations on a scale extreme even by the standards of Myanmar’s history. Estimates of people killed range from official figures of hundreds dead, to estimates by reliable Rohingya organisations of between 2000 and 3000 killed. Before we pontificate on the actions of the Burmese military, it clearly helps if we put our own house in order, and that means immediately suspending training the soldiers of this brutal regime.
Alex Orr
Edinburgh
IT now comes out that Parliament will have to approve the £1 billion to the DUP and prop up the Tory Government (MPs must have vote on £1bn Tory deal with DUP, The National, September 12). Does this mean that the DUP MPs get to vote in favour of this dubious funding? No wonder that nothing had been mentioned before the brave and public-spirited Gina Miller forced this information out of the Treasury.
Shirley Robins
Dunoon
I’M delighted Scotland is going to set up its own investment bank. Hong Kong has its own bank and a booming economy partly because Hong Kong allows all countries who trade with her to invest in her bank. Could Scotland adopt a similar strategy and allow countries who trade with us to invest in our bank?
SC
Aberdeen
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