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.
1 Comment
George Campbell · April 6, 2025 at 10:07 pm
I was told by one of the last native Beauly Gaelic speakers in the 1950’s that Beaully first took its name from the Gaelic for broomfield. The village then was around the site of the railway station which is where the broom still grew when I was a kid.