Dublin City Council has confirmed it is teaming up with an inner city lock picking club to remove the dozens of “love locks” placed by couples on the capital’s historic Ha’penny Bridge.

The move, which involves the council employing experts from weekly club, Tog, was put forward by the city architects section of the local authority, as the locks were causing paint to chip on the 198-year-old tourist attraction, which was leading to rusting.

While the council has previously used cutting devices to remove the items, it has become concerned that the measure may be risking damage to the bridge.

And as a result, from next week, the local authority will be teaming up with the legal lock picker club, Tog, to remove the items individually — an unusual coupling that shows that sometimes opposites do attract.

The “love locks” have increasingly been placed on the high-profile bridge since 2011 by couples hoping to show their love will last the ages — or at least until some new suitor finds the key — in keeping with similar moves by romantics in other European cities.

However, despite the heart-warming gestures, which are also appearing on the Rosie Hackett Bridge further up the Dublin quays, officials across the continent have urged couples to cut out the habit.

In London and Moscow, lovers are being encouraged to stop placing locks on bridges due to the potential damage being caused and instead use designed trees, on the condition that they make a donation to the relevant heart foundation.

However, the clearest reason why the officials want the lock fetish to end has occurred, perhaps inevitably in lovers’ capital Paris, where last June, part of the Pont des Arts bridge collapsed due to the sheer number of locks involved.

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