WHAT I find surprising about the current situation is how commentators seem to see this as a blip, albeit a serious one. Once it is overcome then there will be a resumption of "normality". A recent instance of this is Glasgow Chamber of Commerce chief executive Stuart Patrick's comment ("High living: Chicago-style hotel for city", The Herald, April 16) about the need in Glasgow for "both Grade A office space and city centre hotel rooms for when the economy recovers".

Given the amount of home working there must now be a number of companies (and staff) who are beginning to question the need to rent expensive city centre space. Rather than the future being a continuation of the past what we may see is companies maintaining a small city centre presence supported by a network of home-based staff. Likewise, given that global travel was clearly the reason for the virus spreading so rapidly, there may be a questioning of the need for so much travel.

Rather than planning for the future that is rather like the past it may be more prudent to begin to consider a future where the city centres begin to lose their economic importance. This will have major implications for transport infrastructure, the accommodation and hospitality sectors as well as the utilities. Given that property also features in most pension funds portfolios, all those whose pensions are dependent upon investments are also likely to be affected. The beneficiaries seem likely to be the suburbs and the quality of life for many

Indeed one of the worst outcomes of the current crisis would be for "normality" to reassert itself. This is the opportunity to create a better, more sustainable future.

Keith Hayton, Glasgow G76.

CATRIONA Stewart sums up a problem and identifies the solution: life and cities without cars are better (“Lockdown proves life – and cities – are better without cars", The Herald, April 17).

The coronavirus crisis has gifted us an opportunity that we should not waste, and just as the NHS arose out of the ashes of the Second World War, so an infinitely better life can and should arise out of this pandemic, one where people are valued more than cars.

Ms Stewart suggests how to make the change. It is easy. Across the world from Germany to Chile, road space is being re-assigned with temporary materials. Traffic cones will do it. The Netherlands launched its cycling revolution by these means in the 1970s.

For many years I have been arguing for this simple repurposing of public space, and formed the inclusive cycling charity Free Wheel North around that principle. We get tens of thousands of people of all abilities cycling every year, despite bad infrastructure. The radical changes we advocate are always negated by the old saw “you can’t change things over night”. Covid-19 shows that you can.

I heard on Radio 4 news how the UK population has developed an encouraging response to the virus: it does not accept that health must be compromised because of economics. It is not a matter of balance; it is an urgent ethical absolute. Another amazing attitudinal change is the outbreak of science and evidence in a world so dominated by populist prejudice and internet crackpots. It makes me optimistic that people will wake up to the fact that active lives are the most powerful “vaccine” against viruses.

Now is the time to apply this new awareness to the question of health and transport. As of April 2020, the coronavirus has killed 120,000 people, but cars kill around 10 million people every year. 1.3 million people are killed violently, almost 3,500 per day. More than half of those killed are pedestrians, motorcyclists, and cyclists. The World Health Organisation estimates that around seven million people die every year from exposure to traffic-generated fine particles, leading to stroke, heart disease, lung cancer, chronic pulmonary disease and respiratory infection. Scotland has more than its fair share of the 3.2 million deaths each year due to insufficient physical activity.

I cycled past McDonald's on Glasgow's Maryhill Road the other day. The car park had been repurposed. The drive-through normally embodies everything wrong with the way we live, combining inactivity with fast food. But for once it was a place of joy: toddlers were cycling around the car park.

Coronavirus is a time for examining the car culture through the lens of health morality, and for creating a world where rational judgements defeat an orthodoxy demanding millions of human sacrifices in the name of money.

Norman Armstrong, Free Wheel North, Glasgow G40.