BARRY VAUGHAN, of Higher Street, Dartmouth, writes:

I was most heartened to see the Chronicle reporting aspects of the ongoing discordance between the much valued Dartmouth-based steam railway and riverboat company and the universally cherished Greenway Ferry Company.

Greenway offers other fellow boatmen offering a professional service for holiday and local people, sailing in harmony and 100 per cent safety with others for years. Thus it must be vexing to your readers to be kept guessing as to the real reason why such a gentle led company, whose passenger friendly skippers and crew are a joy to be with, feel distraught enough to ply up and down the river and across to Torquay at hardly half the bus fare for a similar journey!

It would seem to me and others, that the bigger company's board need to look deeper at their current policy of running craft across the bay at the price of an ice-cream, and leave Greenway with their special heritage seagoing fast ship, the irreplaceable 'Fairmile', to do what it does best.

Sometimes, certain business initiatives have unfavourable unforeseen consequences. Certainly, if Greenway cannot hang on – there could be unforeseen steep price rises for all of us should be riverboat reign supreme – back to the £3.50 ferry to Kingswear – remember?

This letter appeals to the Chronicle, editor and reporters, acting as a disconnected third party, to in Times-style, lay out the complete technical facts about this unsettling, sorry contest, before they both become 'wrecks', aground in mutual frustrated impoverishment, only to drive us all back to the busses.