Plans for a piece of noisy artwork to be installed on Ventnor Esplanade are being put before the Isle of Wight Council once again.
The Time and Tide Bell could be placed on Ventnor Esplanade despite an application earlier this year being withdrawn due to issues raised about its location, and health and safety.
Now, in the new application, the bell has been moved further away from the steps of the rotunda bandstand. The sculpture is made of marine bronze on a supporting structure of steel and would be 1 of 16 bells installed across the UK.
They have been designed by international sculptor Marcus Vergette and would gently ring as the waves struck the bell. It is designed to ring at high tide and would be roughly a metre above the level of the beach. The sound of the bell has been recorded to be 70db at other installations, which is said to blend in with the sound of breaking waves.
Planning documents say the sound will ‘quickly dissipate’ over distance, back to the seafront so as to be ‘barely discernible’ to residents above the background noise of the sea.
Objections have been submitted by residents who feel it is too near their properties. 1 said it would cause noise pollution day and night and the land is very unstable where it is proposed to be sited. Another said they felt a better site for the bell, if at all, would be further along the Esplanade, opposite the car park where there are no residential properties.
You can view the plans, 22/01775/FUL, on the council’s planning portal. Comments can be submitted until 2nd December.
Will the bell sound on the last lap will people having a peaceful nap on the beach want to be woken by the alarm bell i wonder
We don’t want any stupid ‘artwork’, least of all noisy whims of some ‘arty’ Emperor’s new clothes type, who, IF you are honest, and say what a waste of cash such is, ‘they’ assume you are thick, dull, and belong in a cave, yet in times of austerity paying people to fit their whims, is crazy.
I hope someone can super glue the clapper if in reach, or some recent arrivals sell it for scrap to make something ‘useful’
Perhaps a more useful idea would be to have these bells all around the coast fitted to stainless steel trip wires which could activate the bells every time another dingy arrives with unchecked, no passport, no money and no home or land, all of which will eventually be funded by US, not the Government or those businesses and lawyers who ‘gain’ from such unwanted cargo here.
What a great idea!
Roughly a meter a above the beach.
That end of the beach can rise & fall from almost pavement level down to bedrock, overnight, good luck with finding a mean height as a datum!! Where are these other locations exactly? No doubt they are all flat beaches which allow the bells to be placed further out to sea, thus becoming a distant sound instead of being right outside of bedroom windows. But the Island based mainland planning officers with zero knowledge of local weather & tidal conditions will think this is a wonderful idea. In reality, this will be a magnet to kids encouraged to swim out to it & most probably become damaged & therefore a danger by the heavy seas which crash in during the storms.
So the artist isn’t even an island resident and won’t have to listen to how the sound travels and disturbs others, every beach and especially town beaches are really noisy because of the buildings reflecting the sound, saying that it will sound like ‘Fill in desired sound here’ before installing it is so foolhardy the whole project should be scrapped, or give it to the Brighton trendys, i’m sure theyd find somewhere to put it..the hourly bells from church street used to make my bones scream! ..another ringing bell offset from the Church st bells and the fire brigade will turn up…
Perhaps it’s funded by a sensible right wing party to warn, as in the wars, of an invasion arriving on Britains coast so as people who value and don’t want their way of life changed forever by uninvited outsiders
Matters little whether they arrive with a gun or begging bowl as the damage to our society being changed is what people died for in the wars. And whilst fighting for freedom they were doing so for their own children and families not anyone understandably wishing to improve their lot in life but at the expense of ours