The tower has risen at the end of McGillivray Lane, in a heritage area. It can be seen from tourist areas including the Bendigo Art Gallery.

Nearby resident Mark Lees sees it every time he looks out his lounge room window.

"It's a blot on the landscape that's in plain view of homes but also of quite a bit of Bendigo," he said.

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"For me it's an objection on the visual side of things. I'm not one of those people who have a problem with 5G, or anything like that.

"We need to have them [the towers]."

Mr Lees said the station also made a "low, dull roar" he could hear inside his house if nothing else was on.

Optus did not need local planning permission to build the tower, the council's director of strategy and growth Steve Hamilton said.

"The City of Greater Bendigo received notification about the location of the temporary tower," he said.

Mr Hamilton said the council could not and should not take action as the facility was "low impact", temporary and did not require a permit.

An Optus spokesperson said the tower replaced a permanent Mundy Street facility that was removed ahead of a redevelopment.

"As a short-term solution, while we find a suitable site for a permanent facility in the CBD, we have deployed a temporary base station to maintain Optus mobile services in Bendigo," they said.

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