...No, my mind is still preoccupied with pylons and the proposal from the National Grid to to run a high voltage line on a route through mid Wales to connect with an existing line in Shropshire. The said route could run from one of 2 hubs (sub-stations) - there are a choice of 10 'corridors'. I have said in an earlier post that we would be on 'purple south'. At the risk of repeating myself, pylons would be a big, big blot on our landscape with a huge impact not only aesthetically but on the local economy too. A route overground anywhere gets a resounding 'No'. 'Undergrounding' (note new verb) is not only preferred but essential.
Marton's public meeting last evening was packed, and Councillor Wynn Jones presentation clear and precise - I now feel able to view the scheme in its wider context, learning in 40 minutes more than I did from attending two National Grid 'roadshows'. This is good.
Councillor Jones patiently spelled out the planning and approval processes; labyrinthine and certainly costly. Somewhere and at sometime 'the man in the street', the voter, has elected representatives to make these decisions on their behalf. We are prey to policy. I begin to think that elections purport to give us what we want, but at the times in between there is no mechanism to let us register disapproval in quite the same way.
On-shore wind power is a good green notion (its efficacy remains unproven however) but the method of transmitting it, based on out-dated technology is surely flawed; if a bunch of people in a village hall out in the sticks can ask such searching questions and indeed suggest some highly technical solutions then where are its instigators the so-called experts coming from? Has it all been thought up on the back of an envelope?
My views and the views of local people at the meeting remain unchanged. No pylons anywhere. No way.
I wake in the night and haul myself over under the duvet's warmth to look out of the window and over the little triangle field. The night is clear, the air silky and cool. Stars are out. Silently, unspoiltly perfect.
Hope it's not too defeatist to think 'better make the most of it'...
13th April - edited to add:
On the evening before the meeting I was interviewed briefly by Radio Shropshire, who afterwards invited listeners to phone in with their comments about the issue. I finally got around to listening to my own interview (isn't the sound of one's own voice curious? I sound as if I've been on a regime of
20-a-day Capstan Full Strength cigs for 50 years...) and stayed listening long enough to hear the first and possibly only comment. Which was:
'Well they've got to go somewhere haven't they.' The caller's unspoken, but strong implication was that we shut up and put up. Grrr.
9 comments:
Keep enjoying that view of yours, and keep fighting to keep it enjoyable.
xo
Fight, F,....you have a lot to lose. We have those enormous towers in our rural community and they and the scar on the land can be seen from tens of miles away.
A few years back, all our electricity cables were put underground. My village now looks much like it must have for several hundred years.
Power to your campaign!
Stay strong and determined. Is there an internet petition for us to sign?
And does the proposed line not cross into Wales? If so what does the Welsh Assembly Government (with elections on 5 May) say? Good luck in your struggle.
Keep smoking the Capstans and fighting..... and remember that people who ring in to radio stations to express their views aren't always the ones with something worthwhile to say! Letters to MPs next, maybe?
Yes, keep fighting. Two communities have successfully fought off windfarms in Pembrokeshire so sometimes the voice of the man in the street (or the rural back lanes in those cases) is heard.
(I'm now humming that ridiculous song in my head. I'll have to change the words: "Underground, overground, keep Marton pylon-free...")
I'm with you, put them underground! Our pylons are aboveground and our hideous. Within the area I live in all of our lines (electric, phone, cable) are underground, it should be that everywhere.
The roll over and die commenter on Radio Shropshire is wrong . The pylons aren't necessary , there is an alternative .
Keep on banging your saucepan lids and Good Luck !
Good luck - the very best of it.
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