‘Guernsey will start to look like a pincushion’
Tuesday 26th August 2008, 2:29PM BST.
Jamie Hooper. IMG_1577
A PROPOSAL for a phone mast at St Saviour’s Reservoir has been met with opposition by environmentalists.
Wave Telecom has applied to install a two-panel antenna at Rue des Choffins, St Saviour’s, in the area surrounding the reservoir.
Jamie Hooper of La Societe Guernsesaise, and a local environmentalist said that although the risk to wildlife would be minimal, it would ruin the surroundings.
‘I’m presuming it will be on higher ground, which will be a blot on the landscape,’ he said.
‘I have seen the application list for these masts, which was extensive and it wasn’t possible for me to visit all the sites.
‘I think all islanders will share the same view that it’s disappointing that some level of sharing equipment could not be reached. Guernsey will start to look like a pincushion.
‘Each telephone company needs to ensure adequate coverage. But it’s the little Guernseyman against the big company and the outcome is normally inevitable.’
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I’ve no idea where any of these phone masts are. I’ve just never noticed them in going about my normal business. I do know the location of dozens of “telephone” poles. There’s one just outside my house carrying the phone lines for a little group of surrounding dwellings and I cannot go more than a hundred yards from my house without seeing several more. There must be many thousands all over the island.
Are “environmentalists” disturbed by these masts, too?
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Ted.
I think you are missing the point!
Normal wooden telegraph poles dont emit microwave radiation unless trees have become little reactors! In fact many telegraph poles have been removed over the years in favour of underground cables. There is absolutely no reason for more masts to be placed in areas of natural beauty. I mean how many mobile phones do we need? Ever heard of ‘too much of a good thing is bad for you’?
This is a very small island and we need to protect these small pockets of nature as best we can. A classic example of why we don’t need anymore is at Rocquaine!! Take a look……..Oh yeah! Very natural, temporary or not!! I’m not an environmentalist, I just care!
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Is it the microwave radiation or the effect on natural beauty that’s bothering the environmentalists or perhaps it’s both?
I find I’m subject to microwave radiation from my cordless telephone base station, my computer wireless networks, my microwave oven, radar apparatus, terrestrial, marine and ariel, my domestic television and radio receivers and broadcasting stations not to mention the cellphone I hold to my ear. I guess you know I could go on. Who is defending me against all these much more dangerous sources?
Further, who is agitating for the dismantling of unbeautiful telephone poles? The phone company is burying the wires only where it is practical and economic to do so.
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It is a real shame and missed opportunity that more mast sharing could not have occured.
Telegraqph poles are inanimate objects, Phone masts are not, and who knows what they will discover in the future and admit too! I can not see that they are completely without health risk/detrement.
Why are so many operators needed. It used to be that depending on which side of the Island you were on you would get either one or another. Now I find on a recent trip I was switching between 4 operators (automatically)!
Too much choice only brings about more rape of our resources, be it local or global.
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Ted, you’re missing a key point: you’re well within your rights to fill your home with wireless devices that emit different types of radiation (microwaves, by the way, aren’t the same as the much stronger electromagnetic pulses that come from phone masts), but that’s your personal choice; apart from the fact that these low-level domestic emissions are much less likely to be as harmful, it’s no-one else’s job to “defend” you against them. Read up on the risks and if you don’t like them, don’t buy them. Phone masts are a different story, though: if a a mast goes up within 350m of your house, that’s not your personal choice – it’s the choice of a corporation who doesn’t care if it puts you and your family at greater risk of brain tumours, cancers, Alzheimer’s and childhood leukemia. These are serious and well-founded health concerns that we have a right to guard ourselves against. Everyone wants this kind of technology to be safe because it makes our lives easier and it makes money for the companies that provide the service, but it simply hasn’t been around for long enough to prove it’s safe in the long-term. Unfortunately, both the scientific and the anecdotal evidence we have at the moment points towards the scary end of the risk spectrum. We are already seeing “cancer clusters” in areas around phone masts, for example. Remember, not so long ago, asbestos was hailed as a “miracle” because it was so useful… Mobile phone coverage is undoubtedly useful, but we might end up paying a much higher price for it if we let phone companies blindly pursue profits without holding them to account. Find research that hasn’t been funded by the communications industry and weigh up the risks after that.
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Sorry to use this thread for private purposes, Ed, but:
Helen, where can I find the research you mentioned?
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I’m not sure whether you mean generally or specifically, Ted, but I’ll try to answer both… Generally, I read as many different newspapers and news magazines as I can lay my hands on, but using the internet is a much quicker way of doing things. Google what you want to research and choose articles from a variety of sources, so you can see through political spin and/or hype. Articles worth their salt will always clearly state their sources – generally a research paper that will also be published online; some even provide direct links. Research papers will generally state their funding body, which can sometimes suggest a bias. Keep an eye on the small print too… An example of a misleading headline is one that reads along the lines of “scientific evidence proves mobile use is safe” which came from an industry-funded study that looked at people who used mobiles once a week for 6 months! Specifically re: mobile phone mast risk, you might want to start with the Naila study (2004), or read more on the canceractive.com website which gives a concise overview. You might find things I haven’t read and come to a different conclusion… I’m not a politician or a phone company employee so I don’t have an agenda – I just like to know that I’ve made my own mind up rather than swallowing what any one newspaper tells me, on this or any other subject.
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Helen, I have a problem with both of the references you give.
The canceractive.com website is unblushingly concerned with alternative medicine and contains several of the weirdest explanations for how the world works and of the causes and treatment of disease I’ve come across. I can’t form any considered judgement on the basis of this sort of stuff.
The Naila study has been reviewed by the Federal Office for Radiation Protection (BFS) in Germany. The study is considered seriously by the BFS, despite “major limitations”, but they conclude it to be of “low significance”.
I’ve been combing the websites of such learned bodies as the Institute of Physics and learned journals such as Nature as well as checking the advice of British, American and German government agencies. None of these sources supports your assertions. Knowing how the effects of smoking cigarettes was denied for years, I’m anxious to find real facts on this subject but not from “alternative” or unsubstantiated sources.
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