Sir – We read with interest the article of January 15 about Trap Grounds in North Oxford, and subsequent letters.

We think it worth putting on record the earlier history of the defence of this area against the threat of housing development, to inform the present debate.

We were involved in this from the early 1980s. From the newly established Hayfield Road Residents’ Association, we, and Joyce Thomas, all of Hayfield Road at that time, opposed the threat of housing development in applications made by Oxford city.

Grounds for opposition included traffic, possible heavy metal pollution of the site, and damage to wildlife.

We met, lobbied and opposed, obtained assays of pollutants and even merited a visit from Kenneth (now Lord) Baker, Secretary of State for the Environment, in 1985 or 86, meeting him on the swing bridge at the bottom of Frenchay Road.

Increasingly aware of the wealth of wildlife in the area, already well known to local and university naturalists, we realised the wildlife was a cause worth fighting for on its own merits.

We formed The Trap Grounds Wildlife Group. We gathered information about the natural history and published the first orange-bound edition of The Wildlife of the Trap Grounds, in 1991, Joyce Thomas penning the original introduction. It is now in its tenth edition.

The management proposals at that time included improving access, removal of rubbish, pollarding of willows and scrub area management. We emphasised its educational interest and took local teachers round the site. These objectives remain essentially unchanged today.

While the term Town Green is potentially confusing in the case of Trap Grounds, campaigners for over 25 years have been very clear about their objectives. The clearly expressed intention throughout has been to save and maintain Trap Grounds for wildlife.

Peter Rawcliffe, Maggie Stopard, Bernard Davis South Hinksey