Your article “Barker planning advice offers work windfall” (News December 8) perpetuates two myths.

1: Householders who object to proposed development are nimbys and should be ignored.

2: Designs carried out by architects are ipso facto good, and therefore it is right that they should not have to submit their projects to local consultation, or the planning process.

This is spurious. We should be honest and admit that we are all “nimbys” when it comes to defending our homes and amenities from threats of noise, loss of sun or view, and potential loss of value.

As for the assumption that the architect knows best, your lead story “Gazprom jury walk-out”, and your well-argued leader (December 8), expose this as arrogant nonsense when a respected firm such as RMJM — and, as Kisho Kurakawa commented, all the six shortlisted designs from your usual galaxy of star architects — ignored the historic scale of St Petersburg in promoting their own grandiose projects.

So no more mockery of nimbys please, but recognition that architects — particularly the “big names” towards whom the architectural press displays breathless reverence — too often prefer the megalomaniac response, euphemistically described as “iconic”, rather than a more low-key respect for the people and existing environment in which they hope to build.

Christopher Maguire, Cambridge

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