Sir, – As a shareholder in Crest Nicholson and a newcomer to Farnham, having lived here for barely a year, it has been impossible to miss the outcry in the town against the joint Sainsbury/Crest Nicholson East Street development proposals. Personally, I find it also almost equally impossible to find any merit in these proposals. They seem to be simply a "smash and grab" attempt by "my" company – smash the nature and integrity of the town centre and grab what you can in profit from a grossly over-intensive development. However, rather than go through in detail all the obvious ways in which the plans are "unfit for purpose" I should like to point out what is perhaps the most eloquent argument against the proposals which is presented in Crest Nicholson's own East Street development framework document. Much of Crest Nicholson's, and indeed the council's, momentum for instigating the redevelopment of this part of town has been the apparent dislike of, and overall embarrassment caused by, the Woolmead scheme, also in East Street. Presumably, in order to hoodwink those who are not familiar with it, and to justify the height of their own proposed building opposite and many others throughout their scheme, the Crest Nicholson framework document describes the Woolmead, and I quote, as comprising "three/ four storey-high accommodation". Anyone bothering to visit the Woolmead and taking a look can clearly see that it comprises two-, three- and four-storey buildings. Indeed the two-storey sections together account for considerably more street frontage than those of four storeys. This is a serious misrepresentation of the truth, particularly when it is used by Crest Nicholson to justify their own proposed building opposite. This, at 20 metres long and four storeys high, is more than twice the width and a full storey higher that any other existing building on that side of the street. Moreover, the proposed building is a bland and dominating style-free mix of meaningless architectural clichés that has nothing whatever to do with Farnham's existing architectural heritage. It is not even, as the Woolmead at least was, an attempt to create something modern, but is merely pure sham. But we are told by Crest Nicholson in their own document [6.1, Context, p 20, para B] that the existing East Street Woolmead buildings "...have little architectural merit or appropriate mass to the town centre architecture". I absolutely agree and look forward to Crest Nicholson's plans being thrown out on the grounds of the recommendations that they themselves have made. Andrew Jones, Fox Yard, Farnham