By Sarah Mac Donald - 22 September, 2013
Complaints about noise pollution have caused the bells of one of the Church of Ireland’s best known churches to be silenced.
The bells of St Bartholomew’s Church in Dublin’s Ballsbridge district have fallen silent after 130 years due to complaints to Dublin City Council about their ringing every fifteen minutes, particularly at nightime.
St Bartholomew’s has been warned by the Council that it faces fines of €3,000 if it doesn’t stop the bells ringing at night.
The warning followed a complaint in 2009, after which a mechanism was fitted to silence the bells between 11pm and 7am. However, that mechanism failed on two occasions.
The Council warned the Dublin Church to either fix the mechanism or turn off the bells permanently, and so a decision was taken by St Bartholomew’s Vicar, Rev Andrew McCroskery, to silence the bells.
It is hoped that a UK based expert on bells and their chiming systems can find a solution to the problem to ensure the church does not breach the curfew again.
However, according to Rev McCroskery any solution is likely to be costly and may not be a viable solution. The alternative is to leave the bells off permanently.
