Sir – I would like to comment on the cycle path study which is the subject of comment in your columns last week and to praise the imaginative and praiseworthy objective of the scheme to form a cycle path between Botley (Dean Court) through Farmoor to Eynsham on the B4044.

Details of the study by Cyclox can be found on the ‘Bike Safe’ website. This study will show to those who have read it that it involves some difficult decisions about acquiring adjacent land, moving hedges and complicated engineering.

Although it quotes an estimated cost of £800,000, that does not include some of the inevitable expenses like these challenges and it would surprise me if the realistic cost of the project was not at least twice that figure; it will certainly be in excess of £1m. That raises the question of whether Oxfordshire County Council can, in the present climate, consider this expenditure (if it had it available) as a priority in the scheme of things and if it can be considered value for money.

At present, the highway is used by few cyclists for reasons of safety but would the increase following the creation of the footpath warrant such expenditure and are there other more worthy ways/schemes to spend the money? Your article states that the study shows that ‘the idea was viable’; I am not sure that the definition of viable would be the same for Oxfordshire County Council as for Bike Safe. I fear that this scheme will stay for the present on the back-burner and get deserved attention in better economic climes.

Charles Mathew , Oxfordshire county councillor for the division of Eynsham