Infiltrator

Slightly o/t but.. Someone suggested less sports coverage - how about even less sports photos. Some of our local sports celebs must be the most photographed in the UK if not the world. Some of the ladies hockey teams seem to have had their photo in every weeks Shetland Times for the last 15 years - I think we all know who they are know by now..

Since Northlink started the service we've taken a chinese takeway on board with us. The food is poor quality and expensive for what you get. It also seems to have nearly as many staff in the cafe as in one that the council would operate. It's about time NorthLink woke up to the fact the service is a way of getting from A to B and not a cruise of the North Sea.

^From the plans and the artists impressions then I think it would dominate the landscape to such a large extent that it would put tourists off visiting. I drove down past the Huntly wind farm earlier this week and tried to imagine what 150 windmills almost double the height would look like. Bad enough driving past it, wouldn't want to live anywhere near it. I likened it previously to being something like the filmset of a Terminator movie - and driving past the Huntly farm only confirmed my thoughts.

^ I'm comparing Shetland tourism to Orkneys, Orkney seems to cater for tourists much better than Shetland and I suspect their overall economic income is greater than Shetlands?. The oil industry in Orkney didn't have the same economic impact as it did in Shetland and as such I think Orkneys tourism industry has, through need, developed much more than Shetlands. Shetland has been able to depend on income from oil and fishing and hasn't needed to depend so much on developing tourism. As an example of how Shetland doesn't take tourism as seriously as it could (should?) - the Clickimin Broch, arguably a world class tourist attraction - where the tourists have to dice with death with the traffic on the South road as the buses have to park on the pavement. It's close proximity to visiting liners is begging for at least a car park and some sort of visitor centre p.s. was in Inverness last week for the first time for years and I'm still baffled what tourists see in the place - is it the scenery? There's the history, but not much to see though. Aberdeenshire has many more castles and large houses.

According to the Shetland Visitor Survey 2005/2006: The top 4 reasons why people visit Shetland: Work/Business/Meetings: 32% Visiting friends and relatives: 15% Birds/Wildlife/Nature/Flora: 5% Scenery/Landscape: 4% And the tourist industry represents 4.9% of Shetland's overall economy. So, let's say that all the tourists who visit on the basis of the scenery and the wildlife stop doing so. Then we lose 0.441% of our economy. Not a massive amount. Significant for those who work in the industry, yes - but there are other avenues of promotion and there will still be plenty of areas of "unspoilt" beauty. And that's saying that they all decide they won't come because of the wind farm. So, what does the Shetland Visitor Survey have to say on how visits to the island could be improved... Hmm, well, out of 23 different options for response, it appears that "keep it unspoilt" comes in at number 20, behind things as improving walking access (see above) and less expensive travel (oh those fossil fuels! if we don't start producing renewable energy... guess what happens to the price of a finite source needed for travel). And then of course we have to factor in the potential for green tourism. Whitelee is currently not accepting visitors because there have been TOO many! Phone them - try booking a tour. They're booked up at the moment. Green tourism is an opportunity. Let's all stop reacting based on our feelings (this will RUIN our island, how could people EVER want to come here again?!) and do a bit of research instead. I said tourism was Shetlands largest 'untapped' resource. The problem at the moment is that travel to Shetland is so expensive that the majority of visitors to Shetland only visit because they have a good reason - work, relatives, etc. They key to tapping into this resource is to make the travel affordable. I'm up shortly and £600+ return on the ferry is extracting the urine. Yes my family could've slept in the bar and we could've hired a 5 year old Renault Clio for £30/day to keep the costs down but.... p.s. I'm effectively a tourist now - build the windfarm and I'll be heading to the Western Isles for my taste of undeveloped unspoilt landscape

This is the point I've been harking on about throughout this thread - it's Shetlands rugged natural beauty that makes it so unique. As for Alan Wishart claiming tourists wouldn't be bothered by the windmills - how delusional can you get? Shetlands biggest untapped resource is tourism. Couple of good letters on SN today from Billy Fox and Allen Fraser - odds are stacking up nicely against this ludicrous project

^A good objection from another body that'll carry some weight

Latest interesting twist - taken from Shetland News. Breaking News Shetland Amenity Trust objects to the Viking Energy application to build a 540MW windfarm in the isles. Trustees this afternoon unanimously agreed to oppose the plan. More soon Good for them

Xoni, you're looking in all the wrong places for advice http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/health/swine-flu-slowly-catching-up-with-diarrhoea-and-hiccups-200907101896/

'‘anthropogenic global warming’ is a dangerous, ruinously expensive fiction, a ‘first-world luxury’ with no basis in scientific fact' Part 2... Another recent article bringing Global Warming into question. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/5804831/Climate-change-The-sun-and-the-oceans-do-not-lie.html

Never considered myself as a conspiracy theorist - but I think global warming is a conspiracy so I guess I must be

Worth reading.. http://www.spectator.co.uk/the-magazine/features/3755623/meet-the-man-who-has-exposed-the-great-climate-change-con-trick.thtml This quote sums it up well '‘anthropogenic global warming’ is a dangerous, ruinously expensive fiction, a ‘first-world luxury’ with no basis in scientific fact'

Fair point, if they build the windfarm maybe they could film Terminator 5 in Shetland?

It's your opinion but I really can't see where you're coming from. Shetlands natural wealth is it's rugged unspoilt scenery, every book and documentary for the last 100 odd years has laboured how unique the islands landscape is. Likewise for the tourists, they visit the isles to escape from industrial landscapes. The best thing to ever happen to Shetland - desecrating the landscape? Oil coming to Shetland was a one-off, right place, right time and it gave the council a powerful bargaining lever. This time it's is different and personally I think planning to spoil the most unique feature of the islands smacks of desperation. Shetland will have a future without the windfarm - 25% of the working population might not be employed by the council any more, but that's a thread for another day.

Shetland is well known as a place where everyone needs to know everyone else's business - I thought maybe Skinnyhobbit hadn't been on the isle long enough to experience this. Very surprised that someone who's been in Shetland that long had to ask why someone on here was being nosey - it's tradition I'm afraid

How long have you lived in Shetland?

Not strictly, littering is an offence and I can see the impact and know it's wrong, carbon emissions on the other hand.... Now where's my patio heater

You demonstrate to me that the emerging nations are doing their bit to save the planet and things like wind farms might move up the priority list in my eyes. Why should we destroy Shetlands landscape when energy efficiency and emissions feature so low on the priority list of some of the fast emerging nations. As has been discussed on here before, global population growth and emerging nations thirst for economic development are huge contributors to global warming (if it exists). Building a huge windfarm on Shetland may ease some folks conscience but is pi55ing in the wind (pun..) on a global scheme.

Wouldn't agree with that - I might want to move back at some stage, and toursists should also be consulted - after all it'll drive many tourists away from the isles (I've suggested to sustainable that they should be canvassing tourists leaving the isles, after visiting, over the summer period to get their opinions) What's tourism worth to the isles again? It's £millions

Likewise - also asked how to add my name to the Sustainable Shetland list (just copy them on the Scottish Government email perhaps?)

You couldn't make up this stuff http://www.shetland-news.co.uk/2009/June/letters/Open%20letter%20to%20Dave%20Clark,%20chief%20executive%20of%20Shetland%20Islands%20Council.htm After the previous leaders dubious connections to his families business affairs you'd think the new leader would try to start with a squeaky clean image - maybe not it seems.

LOL, are you suggesting that folk from Aberdeen have more of a problem fitting in than anyone else...

Sheltered life perhaps? Sick, flaking out and humiliation was just heavy weekend at Nighttragic, LK UHA, LK carnival or a 3 day isle wedding. My first disco in Whalsay when the policeman was away was a real eye opener PaulB picked up on something I've mentioned before. When we left Shetland it then became clear that other parts of the UK can manage to have a public gathering without a beer tent. In Shetland almost every public event from country shows through sailing to music events are expected to have a beer tent. The islands whole attitude to drinking needs to move on, my comment abou Mareel above was tongue in cheek but it also has a serious point - how many other councils would back a venture that uses a large alcohol consumption to break even financially?

You are kidding aren't you? It's maybe a recent culture in the rest of the country but it's long been a tradition in Shetland. It was certainly the case when I was in my teens/early 20's - if you could remember getting home you were seen as a wimp... Lets not knock this early taste for excessive alcohol - it's todays youngsters that will be helping Mareel stay profitable

Has always been so - I'm mid 40's now and most folk my age were drinking most weekends at country discos by 15.