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Comment by crustycoder | Hacker News Reader

In the UK we have 61,626 documented bells (a lower bound) spread across 7,148 towers. https://dove.cccbr.org.uk

In the last year unaffected by COVID, there were 10,701 recorded performances and many more unrecorded ones and practices. https://bellboard.uk/

There are 23,397 Methods and 52,650 Compositions available, where a Method is roughly equivalent to a piece or song in traditional music terms. http://methods.ringing.org/intro.html

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I used to enjoy listening to the church bell practice sessions on summer evenings when I lived by a church (not so much being woken on Sunday mornings though). Annoyingly, they eventually shortened and lessened the frequency of practice because newcomers to the village complained that their idyllic second home in the countryside was affected by "noise pollution"— something that has been a regular feature of village life since the bell tower was built in 1545.

The UK government did promise to reduce the grounds for noise complaints about church bells, on the grounds that normally they were there before the complainant arrived, and would still be there long after they were gone, but it appears it was like many government promises...

https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2018/2-february/news/...

“The church bells had chimed unchallenged every 15 minutes since 1779.”

Over _all the night_. Seriously, this appears to be quite a rational complaint.

It was hardly a surprise, though. They must have known about the bells before they bought the property.

My sister lives about 100m from such a church tower (which has 5 300yr old bells). Its not really as intrusive as one might imagine..

There's usually two different things going on in UK bell towers - bell ringing which involves ringing the bells full-circle using the internal clappers, and clock chiming which uses external hammers driven my the clock. The clock chiming is much quieter than change ringing.

Ours only chimes on the hour but it's going 24/7 and is very close to the surrounding houses (~40m) some of which are uphill and directly in line with the bells. I had to go in today to fettle it as it wasn't chiming and someone had posted on the village FB group that they were missing it. That's a fairly regular occurrence, most people people like hearing them, even through the night. Any complaints we get are when the clock stops.

It is possible to modify clocks to stop them chiming overnight, although ours is still in its entirely mechanical 1883 form, including me having to wind it every week.

If people want this, then it should be fine. To me, in case described in the article above the bells were to stay because of the church and tradition, not because the citizens wanted them.

It's usually one miserable git who complains, most people who buy houses next to big sticky up things at the end of religious building are smart enough to figure out what's in them.

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