According to your article (City’s cyclists in the frame as designs for new bridge revealed, 22 July), this London bridge is “thought to be the first in a major city centre designed for cyclists and pedestrians”. Apart from the Gateshead Millennium Bridge I’d suggest, which I’ve just pedalled across. Although it’s not in the city centre I suppose. It goes across the river Tyne, and it’s north of Watford.
Alan Pearson
Durham
• I don’t know if Somerset gulls are more docile than those in St Ives and elsewhere (Report, 24 July) but all I have to do to scare them from my garden for weeks is rush outside with raised arms, flapping the Guardian above my head.
Wendy Neve
South Petherton, Somerset
• Would Matthew d’Ancona describe himself as “a bearded 47-year-old Tory columnist” (Why smart Tories should not be smug about Corbyn, 27 July)?
Dave Taylor
Purbrook, Hampshire
• You report that John Bercow is “not believed to require an official car for security reasons” (25 July). Following publication of his travel expenses this may no longer be true.
Dr John Doherty
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire
• Re the Labour leadership campaign, the captain you need in a lifeboat is not necessarily the same one you had on the cruise ship (Letters, 27 July).
Jefrey G Pirie
Totnes, Devon
• As a child I assumed it commonplace for there to be a brown glass jar of potassium permanganate crystals in the china cabinet. Not until later did I learn that it had accompanied my father throughout his army service from 1939 to 1945. He bathed his feet in a solution whenever he could. No athlete’s foot or other nasties but his feet did acquire a pale brown colour (Chinese army to stamp out smelly feet, 23 July).
Ann Pugh
Walsall, West Midlands
