I’d be very surprised if fixed links weren’t the cheaper option in the long run. I don’t think it’s that simple though – as I’ve said before, we’re speaking about huge infrastructure projects that will need a massive capital outlay at the start. Where is that amount of money going to come from? And even if it was on the table today, I’d be willing to bet it’d be impossible to build tunnels to Bressay, Unst, Yell and Whalsay before some of the current ferries/terminals have to be sold for scrap/crumble into the sea. As suuusssiiieee has said, it may all have been feasible 20 or 30 years ago but not now. The problem is that in the time the council/councillors have been chasing the dream of providing fixed links - but with no real prospect of them actually being able to be funded or delivered - no thought has been given to replacing ferries and terminals. 7 years have passed now since councillors decided to throw out plans to build new terminals for Whalsay and look at a fixed link instead. And how far has that progressed since? Nowhere. In all likelihood those terminals would have been finished and open by now. As for whether fixed links would be good or bad for the isles – I have mixed views. The isles have changed a fair bit in my lifetime – and that’s all been in the days of inter-island ferries. Isles folk are travelling to the Mainland a lot more for work (and in some cases the other way around) for shopping, social events etc. I think that’s meant fewer shops, pubs, local employers finding it hard to get folk to work for them etc. I can only imagine that increasing still with fixed links. When they’re already under threat, it’ll be harder still to justify keeping island fire stations, secondary schools, care centres, leisure centres, health centres etc. if (for example) a drive from Symbister or Mid Yell to Brae is cut to less than half an hour. Burra is indeed a case in point. On the other hand, I’m sure they’d benefit island industries, folk who work off the isles, residents who want to socialise on the Mainland etc. But I don’t think they’ll be the depopulation ‘cure all’ that some folk make them out to be.