• YOU published what I consider two rather bizarre letters (Tribune, April 18) fiercely opposing LTNs, low traffic neighbourhoods, in Islington and Camden.

In one (Blocked!) writer “JF” asserted that LTNs will lead to our imprisonment in “15-minute cities” (and, even more weirdly, that this will end with our being forced to eat “insects and laboratory-made meat”).

While the more wildly conspiracist elements of this letter merit no response, the writer appears to hold a widely-shared but sadly mistaken, underlying, assumption: that the freedom to drive a car without restriction is somehow more important than the freedoms not to need a car nor to suffer the harms caused by the car, the air and noise pollution, the carbon footprint, the dangers posed to people walking and cycling, and the car’s domination of our public space.

It is these latter freedoms which LTNs can help to secure and which, as two-thirds of Islington and Camden households do not own cars (67 per cent and 64 per cent respectively), will bring greater benefits than the freedom for a few to drive whenever, wherever we want.

The other correspondent, Colin Shipp, damned everything that Camden Council does, but offered no actual case against the proposed LTN in Highgate – extending into Islington too – which triggered his angst (An insane, bonkers, crackpot, scheme…).

He suggests that the council should not meddle in “our community”.

The community is precisely who elects the council’s members, and in a representative democracy we ask them to take collective decisions on behalf of all of us.

In 2022 the Labour party’s manifestos in both Camden and Islington promised to reduce “rat-running” and to introduce other low traffic measures.

And, in both boroughs, Labour candidates won the vast majority of seats.

Does Mr Shipp really think, in the face of this outcome, that he better represents “the community”?

JAMES MACKAY, N1