The well-heeled residents of Marske-by-the-Sea are fuming after a towering 40ft “monstrosity” of a phone mast was plonked smack in the middle of their bustling pavement. The Mail has the story.
One local was so outraged that the 5G mast was being hoisted by the Three network that she parked her car on the site, delaying workmen for more than a week.
However her protest was futile and the mast has now towered above homes and shops in affluent Marske-by-the-Sea, North Yorkshire, since mid-August.
Residents say the structure is “absurd” and “bananas” – especially as it is situated only a few feet away from the entrance to a pizza takeaway, whose owners had no idea it was being built.
To add insult to injury, locals have even claimed that the structure has actually made their mobile signal worse.
Father-of-three Aki Kalkhoran, 43, lives a few yards away and was horrified to see the mast and the associated cabinets appear without warning.
Aki said: “It is quite unbelievable that this thing has been put up on a pavement, which also has a cycle lane, without any proper consultation or thought for people who live and work here.” …
Independent councillor for the area, Dr. Tristan Learoyd, blames Red and Cleveland Council for waving through the proposal from Three.
He said: “There is something very wrong with a planning system which allows this to happen and unfortunately the reason for that is that it’s been done on the cheap.
“There are areas of unused grassland close by which it could have gone onto, but that would have involved paying the landowner and they didn’t want to do that so they stuck it in the middle of the pavement, it‘s absurd.”
Local resident Dave Townie, 70, (left) said: “There is a lot of history to this area. The mast has been erected close to St. Germain’s churchyard, which is where the father of the explorer Captain Cook was buried in 1779, a few weeks after his son’s death.”
Three said the spot was chosen as the best location for local connectivity and a shorter pole had been used to reduce the visual impact.
5G infrastructure is classified as “permitted development”, meaning planning approval is not required from councils, although consultation with the local community is still required.
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