Michael Stevens, of Orchard Terrace, Lower Contour Road, Kingswear, writes:

It was good to read in last week’s paper that a new ­community bus service will connect Kingswear to Brixham, with the last one arriving in Kingswear at 11.30pm. It means Kingswear residents can enjoy theatre visits to Paignton and Torquay, or return from a long train journey and still get home by public transport. Our ­youngsters can also enjoy evenings out of the village.

In contrast, the last buses to return to Dartmouth are the 7.59pm from Kingsbridge and the 7.47pm from Totnes. Dartmouth residents will

be prevented from sharing the new service if the district ­council stops its support of the passenger ferry in the winter evenings.

The open lower car ferry is not suitable for carrying ­pedestrians in the cold, wet, windy winter months and it is not right to suggest otherwise.

The Met Office is predicting an even colder winter to come due to the effects of El Nino.

In terms of saving taxpayers money, it would be more cost-effective to cut the lower car ferry, which must also lose money in the winter evenings. It must be more expensive to run in terms of fuel as both a tug and a float must be transported and the depreciation costs – the money put aside to fund the eventual replacement, as both are special designs – will be higher.

Nor it is acceptable to use taxpayers’ money to subsidise the council-owned lower ferry against the privately owned passenger ferry competitor. Car owners can still use the higher car ferry.