A strong sense of community is a precious and increasingly rare thing in these days when for many people neighbours are more likely to be strangers than friends. It is something to be encouraged. So when the residents of a street threatened with demolition claim that they are one big happy family and don't want to be split up, their feelings deserve to be taken seriously.

The families who live in Fallowfield Gardens at Bierley are unhappy at Bradford Community Housing Trust's plans to knock down around 30 homes, rehouse the tenants elsewhere and build about 60 new properties on the site. That is understandable. They get on well with each other. They are settled where they are.

It is unfortunate for them that they find themselves standing in the way of progress which stands to benefit the wider community of the district. Bradford, with a growing population, needs as many new homes as possible. The plan for Fallowfield Gardens would double the number of properties on the site, replacing crumbling old ones with modern ones intended to improve the quality of life for people living in the area.

If the Trust goes ahead with its plan it must bear the feelings of the residents of Fallowfield Gardens fully in mind by doing what it can to temporarily rehouse them (and their pets and pigeons) in accommodation that meets their needs and is to their liking and then giving them a chance to rebuild their community in the new homes it plans to build in the area that means so much to them.