After reading the various letters in The Gazette about Crossland Road and Brooke Street (The Gazette, June 9), I totally agree this area is being ignored by the council.
I have lived on Crossland Road for two years, thinking it was my best choice when I bought this house!
My house has been vandalised several times and I have spent hundreds on aerials, fences, guttering, secure windows to make it yob proof.
All I can say is that it has not worked.
I can honestly say I live in the dirtiest, most run down area in Marton.
I have even seen rats on the street which is always covered in rubbish and paint.
To make matters worse, since the road was closed off, drivers use the alleyway in the middle as a road.
My son can't even play out anymore as I fear for his safety.
My house has even been hit twice as its too narrow for van and trucks to get through. Luckily Coun Val Haynes is closing it off with bollards after a very long and tiring campaign of phone calls and letters being rejected from the highway department.
As a hard-working single mum, I pay my tax and will not put up with the standards of
cleanliness in this area.
I have never missed payment of a council tax bill.
I don't see why I should be ignored when the council is spending thousands on the
Promenade.
Maybe I should sell my house and move into a "new improved" council house and quit my job.
NAME AND ADDRESS SUPPLIED
n Can I point out unruly neighbours don't just come from a particular class unable to demonstrate any skills in citizenship.
There's so much emphasis on personal
freedom the importance of being responsible within that freedom is ignored. Freedom and responsibility go hand in hand if we are to exist in harmony as a community.
As most problems involve rented
properties, there is the role of the owner.
It is often a case of out of sight, out of mind.
You would expect some ethical obligation extending to neighbouring properties and
individuals in any right to rent out property.
We used to live by Crossland Road and sometimes regret leaving the strong
community we enjoyed there. It takes a few people to create and maintain a strong
community but it only takes one, with a blinkered sense of freedom, to destroy it.
Colin Reed
Marton


More patrols will foil yobs
I was disgusted, like many of your readers to read of the damage caused to Hawthorne Park, Thornton ( The Gazette, June 26 ).
The local authority could be
forgiven for giving up on
providing such facilities if this is how they are treated.
Having said that, maybe some clue as to what's going wrong is contained in your report which says the damage was done between June 12 and 18.
This infers no-one from
officialdom (be it the council or police or whoever) can be more specific about when the damage was actually done.
This in turn infers no-one has patrolled or inspected the park for a whole week!
Surely if they had, then they would have been able to pinpoint more accurately when the
vandalism was done.
So therein lies one solution to vandalism in our parks. More
supervision on a regular basis, please.
David Nightingale
Lytham Road
Blackpool

NVQ is just a job safeguard
Re the letter over the NVQ for taxi drivers (The Gazette June 21). As always 20 per cent truth 80 per cent spin.
I have an NVQ and NVQ level Two. All the NVQ's means to me is a safeguard for my job.
NVQ was brought in as firms said there was a shortage of trained employees.
This was not always the case.
Take British Rail for example. They trained their staff to BR standard but their qualification was only recognised by BR.
So when BR was privatised all their staff had to be retrained to NVQ standard so the qualifications they had were recognised by the firms taking over.
So all Blackpool Council has done is to make sure your job is recognised nationally.
NVQ does what it says on the tin your job is recognised and you have the papers to prove it.
R Halloway
St Annes Road
South Shore

Thanks go out to family doctor
We would like to thank our family doctor from Yate Street Surgery who is retiring the end of this month.
Dr Pattinson has been good to both of us and also our mother, who is 85-years-old.
She has always taken time to
listen, no matter how busy she has been.
We look on Doctor Pattinson not only as our GP but also a friend.
If it was not for her, we wonder if either of us would have been here today.
She has always made sure we got the best care.
She's one of the old school, and she's going to be badly missed. We would like to thank her and wish her all the best in her retirement. God bless you, Doctor
Pattinson, and also your family.
Mr and Mrs GP Mann
Bispham
Bus services weren't early
Further to Mr.Dixon's letter (The Gazette, June 25) staff have checked the ticket machine records for the 08:03 line 16
journey from Harrowside to Blackpool Town Centre.
There is no evidence the driver of any journey operated early.
We recommend all passengers arrive at their bus stop five
minutes prior to the scheduled
departure as watches and ticket machine clocks do vary.
Steve Burd
Managing Director
Blackpool Transport