YOUR comment (Opinion, September 8) re the Hereford Bull's international fame seemed a wee bit lavish.

In the past when people in India, Vietnam, China, Pago Pago, Tahiti, South Africa, Mexico, Alaska etc asked me to describe Hereford I used to mention white-faced cattle. Unfortunately this served merely to add confusion to ignorance regarding Hereford's place in the wider scheme.

Nowadays asked the same question, I reply, Hereford personifies gradualness. This usually produces a request to be more specific.

I say, in 1929 an Alderman Monkley articulated the case for a ring road for Hereford. Invariably I am asked: "what happened." Oh! he died in the sixties, I murmur. "But what of the ring road," the knowledge seekers inquire. Other notable figures took up the challenge and lobbied hard and often to get it approved. Like Alderman M they died without realising their dream.

Often at this point in the dialogue I am accused of licence in respect of my conception of gradual. It is rightly explained that a total lack of progress cannot be described as gradual.

But the project isn't dead I explain. In 2029, the centenary of the first articulation of the need for a ring road will be celebrated.

Coincidental to that event, Tony Blair's Commons majority is expected to decline to 10. It is also anticipated the Tories will be on the brink of resolving their leadership problem. Because nothing grips the entrails of a politician more savagely than the prospect of defeat at the next election, Blair is expected to respond gratefully to a Liberal offer of support in return for funding for a Hereford ring road. He is expected to promise to give it top priority whenever our troops vacate Iraq.

On the basis of other predictions, it is believed the ring road will not then be needed. By 2029 polytunnel technology will be so advanced it will be possible to bury Hereford under several thousand miles of D/section polytunnel to provide an enclosed visually attractive vehicle track, inside which conveyances with linear motor propulsion will be computer-controlled and able to discharge passengers and goods at any street or road junction.

A further prediction is that, in 2105, the centenary celebration of the first explanation for relinquishing plans for a ring road will embrace the notion that polytunnel expressways will not be needed because Hereford's affinity for gradualness has ensured a welcome for the next technical revolution we are unlikely to utilise.

The next request is for more information about white-faced cattle.

J F J JOHNSON, Dewpond Close, Hereford.