How can our councillors consider spending £4.7million on converting the old bus park in Queens Street, into a dozen or more business units, to be offered to digital and creative businesses, when there are already many empty buildings in the town, more every week...Empty for years and up for let for a long time - another Alumno Idea?

If Colchester’s bid for up to £25million of the Government's Town Fund is successful, to spend any of it on more empty buildings is wasteful.

If we are trying to encourage people into the town, remember, the approach into it is via Roman roads which are uphill - not very accessible to the disabled, elderly or mothers with pushchairs and young families.

Years ago it was a wrong decision to move our bus station, build Firstsite and rename it the Cultural Quarter - a big mistake for the town and businesses in Queens Street.

There is now the idea of spending £1million on Balkerne Gate and the graveyard and overnight soup kitchen that is St Nicolas Square.

A good idea, and if the Odeon was reopened, that might bring people into the town.

The town was great before all the wonky ‘art’ installations and Covid barriers appeared. It would be cheaper to leave well alone and enhance it with a bit of elbow grease in the form of weeding, painting and tidying up!

So let’s not be in a hurry to fill the open, left derelict space of the old bus park with yet more buildings until we work out what attracts people to the town in the first place.

More people are now working from home so don’t need office blocks but they do need some kind of relaxation - Castle Park - Open spaces.

Betty Constable

Margaret Road, Colchester