• I READ your March 7 Property News report on the Gondar Gardens development proposal with some sympathy for the objectors.

Among the reasons offered for opposing any building on the site is that slow-worms thrive there, as do many other species, and that reducing the open space would be harmful in an area which is otherwise built up and possibly polluted.

To know anything about the pollution would need metering on the spot, which Camden does not yet offer. To put the matter of a loss of “green lung” area in perspective, it is instructive to look at a satellite map.

Whether the worms live on the disputed green space or not remains to be disclosed by research, but the sizeable Hampstead cemetery is just to the north west of the Gondar site, and next to that is an even larger green and open air sports ground.

Perhaps the strongest reservations to the plans are that facilities for those who can least afford them are becoming rarer and ways should be found to deliver them nevertheless.

MALLORY WOBER
NW3