RTE has angered environmentalists by erecting a barbed-wire fence around its transmitter at the top of Mount Leinster in Co Carlow. The station does not have planning permission for the eight-foot barrier, but claims it was given a "verbal go-ahead" by Carlow County Council officials. This is denied by the council.
Recreational users of the area say they are outraged by the development as the top of Mount Leinster, the highest of the Blackstairs Mountains, is now inaccessible. About 3 1/2 acres have been fenced off.
A Green Party councillor, Ms Mary White, said the structure was "obscene" and that "the mother of all environmental fights" will take place to ensure it is taken down.
She said the development could lead to similar fences being erected around masts on mountains elsewhere, "in which case we can kiss hillwalking goodbye".
Ms White, the party's national spokeswoman on the environment, has written to the council's senior planning officer, Mr Liam Fitzgerald, requesting immediate action to force RTE to remove the fence, which was erected in recent weeks.
The development, she wrote, was "an act of vandalism".
"The fragile ecosystem, comprising bog, heather and thousands of years of gently laid-down organic matter, has been brutally destroyed right around the perimeter fence by track machines," she claimed.
"The fact that the mast has been in place for almost 40 years or more would indicate that RTE have had little or no trouble with their station or their pylons or hawsers. I am sure there is full public liability in place."
However, Mr Tom McCarthy, of RTE's network support division, said the fence was necessary to protect both the public and the station's property. RTE was required to erect the barrier under health and safety regulations published by the Office of the Director of Telecommunications Regulation a year ago.
In recent months, there had been a theft at the transmitter when a number of heavy rolls of cable had been removed and allowed to roll down the mountains. RTE did not have written permission for the fence but had held discussions with Carlow County Council planning officials and had been given a "verbal go-ahead", he said. A spokeswoman for RTE said on Monday that the fence was a "temporary" one which had been put in place "to see if it will withstand the weather". If it did, it would be left in place and planning permission for the structure would be sought.
However, Mr McCarthy said yesterday that this was incorrect and the station did not in fact require planning permission. He said Carlow County Council's planning officials had confirmed this.
The council secretary, Mr Jim Kearney, said there was no question but that planning permission was required, as the fence was more than two metres high. "We're writing to RTE to tell them that," he said.
A spokeswoman for the council's planning section said a number of complaints about the fence had been received.
In a letter to the council on behalf of the Tullow Mountaineering Club, Mr Patrick Looney said those who walked up to the mast were now confronted with a "prison-like structure".
"We, as a club which regularly uses the mountain for [the] recreational activities of mountaineering and hillwalking, have been greatly angered and shocked to see what damage has been done," he said.
A member of the club, Ms Bernie Bolger, said yesterday that access to the top of the mountain had been cut off for walkers climbing from the Wexford side. It was not even possible to walk around the fence because of the damage which had been done to the ground.
"Some members have been walking Mount Leinster for at least 20 years, and there are people on it every week. The mast would be used as a meeting point, but now which side of the fence would you meet on? We could always walk over the mountain, but our right of way is gone," she said.
Ms White says the Friends of Mount Leinster group, which she chairs, will fight the development in the courts if necessary. The group has funds left over from a successful campaign a decade ago which opposed plans for an opencast mine in the area.
She found it "deeply repugnant" that the State broadcasting body could claim the right to close off the top of a mountain to the public.
