I STRUGGLE to understand why it is such a problem to find somewhere for our children to play on their bikes.

This may sound a simplistic way of putting the argument about the proposed BMX track in North Hykeham, but often the simple solution is the best.

Years ago, when I was a child in this city, we would cycle along the woodland pathway running along the A15 northbound to hills and valleys.

There, we would burn off bucket loads of energy on our bikes. At the end of the day, we would cycle home.

True, there were some injuries, but this was all part of growing up. Admittedly, there were fewer cars on the road, but then we did have the woodland path and the bypass was a distant dream, a bit like the eastern section is today.

What those in power need to understand is, unless the young people of today have somewhere to burn off energy, it becomes pent up and is then released in an explosive surge, often of violence.

Modern parenting appears to be about wrapping children in cotton wool and sitting them in front of a LCD screen to be occupied. Children by their very nature are inventive and resourceful, give them an area, like hills and valleys and they will build their own track and have hours of fun.

Better they break an arm falling off a bike than have it broken by another child wielding a plank of wood because that was what he saw happen on the television or in a computer game.

DAVID HARDING-PRICE Bunkers Hill, Lincoln.