Council Helps Silence Emmer Green’s Noisy Mast

EMMER Green residents can finally enjoy a peaceful night’s sleep after the Council’s Environmental Health team helped silence a nuisance noise coming from a nearby transmitter mast.

Weary local residents approached the Council a few months ago complaining of ‘a mysterious moaning noise’ echoing through their neighbourhood, which began out of the blue and could be heard over hundreds of metres.

They reported the noise was constant throughout day time and night time hours, disturbing people’s sleep. One resident was convinced she was suffering from tinnitus after hearing constant background noise whilst trying to sleep.

Residents claimed the noise was coming from the Hemdean transmitter mast located on Morlais, and this was confirmed by Council officers visiting the site.

Dave Acreman, the Council’s Senior Environmental Health officer, initialised a meeting with the mast company responsible for the transmitter, and its acoustic specialist. This subsequently resulted in gaining the necessary permissions from all the telecoms companies using the mast to switch off the equipment one piece at a time in order to isolate the source.

After investigation, the culprits turned out to be two small fans attached high up on the mast, vibrating and turning it into a giant tuning fork, which explained why the noise was carrying over such a large distance. The fans have since been replaced.

Cllr Karen Rowland, Reading Council’s Lead for Environmental Services, said:

“I do hope that the residents of Emmer Green are relieved with the successful efforts made by the Council’s Environmental Health team in finally bringing some peace and quiet to their community.

“Whilst the Council’s noise team has legal powers to enforce against nuisance noises, in the case of businesses causing the noise, it is always preferable for the companies to work with us to resolve any problems. In this instance, the mast company was extremely co-operative throughout, as were the local residents who continued to report the problem and provided noise recordings to help us in our investigation.

“I know how challenging it can be to report something continually, and residents are often concerned that ‘nothing ever becomes of my report.’ This case clearly proves just how important reporting is and I really must thank the residents for their diligence, time and efforts to do so which allowed our officers to resolve this.”