PEOPLE fighting to protect the area around Culloden from giant pylons (“Conservationists fight the second battle of Culloden”, The Herald, May 10) should take a trip to Beauly – so named by Mary Queen of Scots, who remarked “c''est un beau lieu” (“what a beautiful place”’) when she visited in the 16th century. There they can view the appalling £800m Beauly to Denny line that cost nearly three times what was expected. With almost 20,000 dismissed objectors it can only be described as environmental vandalism. Huge swathes of the Highlands have been destroyed with massive pylons and thick, glistening transmission lines criss-crossing the skyline. Built, according to Fergus Ewing, because of wind factories. A tsunami of wind developments have since been proposed along its length and local citizens have battled against multinational giants to protect the environment where they live ever since.
Once-attractive train journeys from Inverness are now spent trying not to look out of the window. The Wester Balblair substation in Beauly is impossible to view in its entirety except from the air and still it continues to grow. SSE say it is a “hub” now and more Beauly/Denny-size pylon lines will be coming into it. It is a mess, a sci fi movie set, an alien landscape.
This “beautiful place” has been sacrificed, by the Scottish Government, in the name of an energy source that is only clean and green in the propaganda that promotes it. A noise abatement notice was served on SSE by Highland Council after the “Beauly Buzz” at Wester Balblair kept residents awake at night and could be heard several miles away. Three years on it is still not resolved and with more lines to be connected the situation can only get worse. Some poor residents have been reportedly driven to distraction with one buying a touring caravan so he and his wife could go somewhere quiet to sleep. Glasses of water in bedrooms ripple. Fishermen on the famous River Beauly, that has the heavy noisy transmission lines strung above it, complain of the noise. Some say they will never return. Some living under the lines say it is like having a microwave on in your bedroom at night.
The beauty and tranquillity has gone, forever. Culloden, be warned.
Lyndsey Ward,
Darach Brae, Beauly.
IT would appear that once more we are being conned into accepting electricity pylons.
Why is it that the National Grid has confirmed that it is to spend £10 billion taking down pylons and burying the power lines? Could it possibly be that this course of action is being taken in the south of England? But then one finds that a similar course of action is being actioned in Snowdonia National Park because of its natural beauty.
We were informed that the Beauly to Denny inter-connector could not be buried due to immense technical problems and the massive pylons now loom over areas of great natural beauty. Not satisfied with this they now wish to despoil the Culloden battlefield with pylons. This is a highly significant war grave and should be respected by all, even those who seek profit at all costs.
David Stubley,
22 Templeton Crescent, Prestwick.
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