I SEE that Marlborough has been ranked ninth in an index of 1,000 shopping areas taken across the country and based upon the proportion of upmarket shops that those selected areas contain.
Marlborough’s achievement in that survey will probably attract more visitors to the town and this will be good news for the traders.
We can be justifiably proud of our High Street; there is however one ‘outlet’ that is sadly missing from the street and that’s a pubic toilet.
The nearest and, incidentally, only public loos are to found in the George Lane car park that is some distance away from the High Street; the quickest way of reaching them being via a hazardous slope and then by negotiating a very busy supermarket car park. 
Recently opened, there are just three individual unisex conveniences, including one for the disabled. 
Will that meagre number cater for the hundreds of people descending on the town every day? I doubt it. And if you are lucky enough to get a cubicle, make sure you have a 20p piece to hand.
I consider that depriving the High Street of public toilets is shocking. Whatever happened to the proposed re-opening of the toilets beneath the Town Hall? And why are the Chantry Lane ones at the western end of the street now closed? I think we deserve some answers.
ROBERT MACMILLAN
Kelham Gardens
Marlborough