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Letters / Not even the slightest relief from the noise

So, calls for a restriction on weekend HGV movements have been rejected by the planning committee.

SIC convenor Malcolm Bell added the staggering utterance “I think this is a perfectly reasonable request”.

Really? For whom exactly? Certainly not for the residents affected.

Councillors approve new working hours for converter station construction site

Mr Bell has taken this decision with complete indifference to the implications this may have for the quality of my life.  He has never bothered to ask me my thoughts on the matter yet has the gall to decide for me.

Mr Agnew, SSEN’s representative, issued the thinly veiled threat to the planning committee that adding a condition to HGV movements would have “unintended consequences in practical terms”.

So, is he meaning a couple of hours delay at the weekend of vehicle movement would scupper the works somehow?  If so, it sounds as if the whole sorry business is maybe not going as well as expected.

I live next to the construction site. For seven nights a week I have a searchlight shining through my bedroom curtains. Throughout the day there is noise from all the construction work and vehicles.

I can no longer listen to the silence or birdsong at night because of the constant noise of their generator but I realise this is of no consequence compared to the absolute necessity of getting the construction of this ‘project’ completed without any delay.  Personally, I could not care less if it is never finished – the environmental destruction has been done.

Councillor Cecil Smith went on to advise that although he was never a wind farm supporter “we’ve just got to live with it”.
Sadly that is so now but it is not affecting him and his support against this call would have been appreciated.  At least councillors Manson and Sandison had the decency to realise that residents “need a break”.

So, it has now been decided for us, that the occupants living next to the construction site will not be given even the slightest relief from the noise. It has been deigned more important that consideration should be given to the workers to allow them to make it back to Sellaness for their evening meals. I think that says it all.

These workers have chosen to work here and presumably understand the implications of this way of life for them.

Ironically local people have had no such choice about their way of life. What we are having to live with has been imposed on us with no due thought or concern by the majority of a council committee.

I know there are people who will read this and scoff at my comments, but they don’t know my circumstances nor are they walking in my shoes.

Evelyn Morrison
Kergord

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