From Clattery to Wandylaw: I should have seen it coming

My favourite place in the whole world, surpassing even Venice, was a damp two-room cottage on the moors above Warenford in Northumberland.

It was called Clattery or, on the maps, Clattering Houses. My family rented it as a weekend retreat for most of the last century, and my mother was born there in 1909.

My family at Clattery, circa 1909

My grandfather (in Panama hat) and the family business from which he apparently needed a weekend retreat: the Lion Garage in Alnwick Market Place

Clattery in July 1986, when I moved in

I was lucky enough to live at Clattery full time for two years in the 1980s, while I pretended to write a book. I will never forget the magical view down to Bamburgh and the Farnes, or the sweep of the Longstone light in the evenings.

I thought its peace and beauty were timeless, but the place is a ruin now. I left when the neighbouring Wandylaw estate decided to try its luck at opencast coal mining. Since then a much bigger profit opportunity has emerged in the form of a wind farm.

Today's view of Wandylaw from Adderstone, where my great-grandfather was the local blacksmith

With hindsight, I should have seen all this coming. Clattery got its unusual name from the racket of the primitive drift mines once worked on the moors, while you probably don’t need me to explain that “Wandylaw” means “windy hill”.

The fact that I never go back to my favourite place is sad for me, but of no consequence to anyone else. Those moors were the opposite of a tourist hot spot. Many years ago my uncle introduced me to Ros Castle, the hill fort a little further inland, and pointed out the seven castles one could see from its top.

Now visitors to this favourite resort of the foreign secretary Sir Edward Grey seem much more likely to end up counting turbines.

Looking east from the roadside near Ros Castle

Which is another shame, though Ros has never drawn the huge numbers of visitors its breathtaking views merit. But then a major part of the attraction of Northumberland has always been the ability to go hill walking or sit on a stunning beach, and feel that one has the place almost to oneself.

Sadly this becomes a serious handicap when attempting to stir up opposition to those who would transform the character of the place in the pursuit of profit.

My own position is unusual in that, for most of the last 25 years, I have had my home in Northumberland but earned my living elsewhere. Hence I tend to see the county from the semi-detached perspective of a frequent visitor rather than that of a permanent resident.

I have never wanted to take my holidays anywhere else, and have spent the last five years battling with a series of dreadful summers to bring my wife round to my point of view. Last week I felt we came close to a breakthrough as the children played happily on the sun-drenched sands of Newton-by-the-Sea, fortified by truly excellent fish and chips from the village’s Joiners’ Arms.

Family holiday fun at Newton-by-the-Sea

Driving around the county, the intrusion of huge wind turbines into the views I have loved all my life upsets me, and the prospect of many more seems simply appalling. But I am well aware that my views are not universally shared. Even my four-year-old son disloyally announced that he found them “pretty”.

I haven’t yet been able to ascertain his views on the alternatives, though I hope he will share my joy in the irony that those who shouted loudest to defend the miners from “the Tories” now seem to be the most vociferous opponents of the new fossil fuel technology of fracking.

Personally, I’d prefer some fracking rigs and the odd fully functional nuclear power station to serried ranks of intermittently operative wind turbines. I’d also like to explore the potential for a revival of coal, plus wave and tidal power.

But, at the end of the day, the will of the people should prevail. If those who share my son’s perception are in the majority (and I hope not, because he’s been wrong about most things up to now) let us proceed with a wind farm free-for-all.

If not, neither central Government nor local planners should be trying to impose them on unwilling communities.

If I prove to in the minority, I’ll sadly move on from Northumberland as I did from Clattery and never come back, though I hope I may continue to enjoy some very precious memories.

www.blokeinthenorth.com

Originally published in The Journal, Newcastle upon Tyne.

Revolt against this madness of the wind turbine blight

Have we all gone completely mad? That is the question to which I keep returning as I contemplate the future of my beloved home county of Northumberland.

On many days the pictorial “View of the North” that graces this paper’s letters page features a glorious, panoramic view of the unspoilt Northumbrian countryside. The one from Auchope Cairn yesterday was a particular gem.

Surely anyone can see that these landscapes, and the precious tranquillity they offer, are our greatest economic asset? They are the reason people move here and spend their leisure time here, and so support a wide range of local enterprises. Why are we even contemplating the utter folly of trashing all this beauty and peacefulness with growing numbers of gigantic wind turbines?

Yes, I know a few people find them beautiful: one person e-mails me every time I write on this subject to tell me so. I also appreciate that others sincerely, though misguidedly, believe that we have no alternative but to make this supreme sacrifice in order to “save the planet” from the effects of manmade climate change.

Such zealots may be relatively few in number, but they seem to have had, up to now, a wholly disproportionate influence on those framing national energy and local planning policies.

Hence we have crazily allowed an array of giant 410ft turbines at Wandylaw and Middlemoor to wreck the once glorious views from the “Heritage Coast” to the National Park. Yet any idea that “enough is enough” seems utterly alien to the subsidy-hungry promoters of these monstrosities, who are now eager to pile on yet more damage to the adjacent fine scenery at Middleton Burn and Belford Burn.

This is the view that St Cuthbert would have enjoyed from Lindisfarne, and one wonders when and how he is likely to react. After all, he has form in these matters, having famously shrouded Durham cathedral in fog to save it from approaching German Baedeker raiders in 1942. Perhaps he will send down 25 years of impenetrable coastal haar.

Meanwhile, as I wrote last week, another applicant is seeking to insert the thin end of the wind farm wedge into Whittingham Vale and Coquetdale, with an application for a 256ft turbine at Follions Farm.
This may be smaller than the behemoths of Wandylaw but it will still dominate local views, plonked in the middle of open countryside designated as of high landscape value and right on the fringe of the National Park. There could be few worse places to erect a turbine unless we intend the National Park to be completely hemmed in by wind farms on every side.

Bafflingly, in view of the overwhelming weight of objections from local residents, visitors, parish councils and the National Park itself, this proposal has been recommended for approval and comes before the Planning Committee at County Hall at 6pm this very evening.

Distributing leaflets to bring this to the attention of my neighbours on Sunday, I found considerable anger that their views are apparently being ignored by those in authority; but also, in some, a fatalistic sense that “there is nothing we can do”.

Well, there is. The ruination of our county by onshore turbines is no more inevitable than the widely predicted triumphs of fascism or communism, or UK entry to the euro. We just need, collectively, to make it emphatically clear to our elected representatives how we feel on this issue, and that they won’t be in office too much longer if they choose to ignore us.

After all, we have even got the substantial figure of Eric Pickles on our side, with his pronouncement of July 29th that: “The views of local people must be listened to when making planning decisions. Meeting Britain’s energy needs should not be used to justify the wrong development in the wrong location.”

Do please join me and my neighbours at County Hall this evening if you can. We shall come in peace, though I may see whether we can borrow the newly recreated banner of St Cuthbert to accompany us.

Even if not, I feel sure that he will be with us in spirit.

We peasants may be growing madder, but surely sanity will ultimately prevail. Won’t it?

www.blokeinthenorth.com

Originally published in The Journal, Newcastle upon Tyne.