Denmark councillors approve reserve land use for Telstra mobile phone tower

Shire of Denmark councillors have agreed to relinquish a portion of Reserve 43491 on Ocean Beach Road for a new Telstra tower to address mobile blackspots along the Denmark coastline.

Telstra is seeking to construct the tower within the Shire quarry reserve on Ocean Beach Road, which requires an agreement to excise a portion of the reserve, with the matter passed at Tuesday’s council meeting.

Funding has been awarded to Telstra to address the blackspots along the Denmark coastline by establishing a new macro cell base station.

The station would extend Telstra’s 3G and 4G coverage by improving and filling in the existing mobile coverage gaps, as well as providing improvement to local and coastal coverage.

It will also provide further benefits to those living, holidaying, travelling and working in the surrounding area.

Telstra also requires the Shire to create a non-exclusive access and utility easement over the existing quarry-access track to ensure legal access to the proposed land.

Over the past year, Telstra had been working towards installing the infrastructure on an area of the Denmark Community Windfarm site, which was previously approved by the Shire for a 50m concrete monopole construction.

The new location of the Shire quarry reserve will be less visually intrusive than previous proposals.