As a born-and-bred Cumbrian, I agree totally with Simon Jenkins (A zip wire is the last thing the Lakes needs, 30 November). He highlights that the area is part of the national park and is entitled to protection from inappropriate planning and development. The Lake District planning authority is demonstrating a total lack of care.

The proponents of this ridiculous plan claim to want to attract more young people. The park has huge numbers of all ages enjoying the peace and beauty we can offer. This is a national park, not a giant fairground. The new jobs created will be tiny in number. The park only recently achieved world heritage status after years of trying. This will put such status under threat. If passed, this plan will lead to other moneymaking developments such as the reemergence of plans for a Thirlmere zip wire, cable cars and even more inappropriate out-of-town retail outlets blighting our lovely market towns.

Mike Telford

Cockermouth, Cumbria

• It is hard to believe that Simon Jenkins has been to Honister Pass recently, if ever. Honister Pass does not back on to either Pillar or Scafell. These hills and Cat Bells are more than three and a half miles away and obscured by the fells in between. It is only from Dale Head that the crag can be seen and the summit of this is almost a mile away.

The pass is a far from tranquil spot. There is a busy car park and visitor centre, an active slate mine and every weekend there is an endless stream of motorbikes racing up and down. Unlike national parks in the US and elsewhere, British national parks are human landscapes and have to support a rural economy and population, otherwise they will just be the preserve of second-home owners from the home counties.

Rigby Jerram

Kendal, Cumbria

• I yield to nobody in my own love of the Lake District. Simon Jenkins’ heart is in the right place, but he needs a sense of proportion. I am staying only a few miles from Honister this week. I can only suggest that Simon, as I did this morning, stands at the bottom of the proposed zip wire run and looks up. That side of Fleetwith Pike is a desolate wasteland of scree, mining waste and footpaths, which have been rerouted many times to address the erosion caused by thousands of, yes, walkers’ boots.

The impact of the new wire will be minimal. There is no “manifest natural beauty” to be affected. Visitors to the glories of Buttermere and Borrowdale will be totally unaffected. And Honister’s chief economic asset has, for centuries, been the slate mine, not “its emptiness and tranquillity”. Yes it is a “ravine of exquisite ruggedness” but that is partly because of the awe-inspiring work of the miners there.

And I strongly suspect that, while Simon accuses the Lake District planning authorities of caving into private profit, what is actually happening is that a lifeline is being thrown to a business that has to operate very much on the margins, but which has revitalised one of the most striking pieces of our industrial heritage in the north of England.

Anthony Nixon

Waterlooville, Hampshire

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