SIR - Anyone who travels along Leeds Old Road will have noticed a new Aldi store with parking for 90-odd cars being built in a residential area on the site of the old Thornbury Middle School. Apparently planning permission was granted over two years ago after “more than 1,400 letters outlining the project were delivered to homes and businesses in the Leeds Old Road area” to quote an Aldi spokesperson from a T&A report of the time.

In characteristic business speak it goes on to talk of enhanced customer service and choice through increased competition, job creation, a boost to the economy. Yeah, tell that to the people who will soon have to look out of their windows on this eyesore, blighting their lives with light, noise and congestion from sunrise to sunset, seven days a week, as well as the downward effect on the price of their houses.

Would this have been allowed in Baildon, Bingley, Burley-in-Wharfedale, Ilkley? Definitely not! It seems anything goes in poorer areas of Bradford. You could start a scrapyard in Holmewood, build an abattoir in Undercliffe for what the authorities care. Couldn’t Aldi have sited their enterprise unobtrusively in the retail/business area off Dick Lane?

A Waterhouse, Barmby Road, Bradford