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COUNCILLORS have raised well-being fears over plans to site a mobile phone mast in a Longridge church tower.
They are on tenterhooks that emissions from the transmitter could harm the health of worshippers at St Paul’s Church, nearby residents and children at the primary school opposite.
Members of Longridge Village Council were responding to a renewed application to install antennas for a mechanical phone transmitter in St Paul’s tower.
Mobile phone giant Vodafone has re-submitted the plans, first applied for more than seven years ago. At that term, the proposals caused a storm of local protest and objections from city councillors, although they were eventually passed by Ribble Valley planners but never absolutely carried out.
Now that application has lapsed and Vodafone has put in a new application for three Dual Ensemble antennas and an internally sited equipment cabinet in the tower.
Town councillors initially seemed minded to admit the renewed plans after Coun Jim Rogerson pointed out that this time circular there were no local objections for the meeting to consider, and that technology had improved over seven years.
Source: Longridge Today