An Irish Planning Students Blog

MINISTER FOR the Environment John Gormley has told Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council to reconsider plans to rezone land in south Dublin as part of its county development plan or he may make a direction forcing it to do so.

Councillors voted to accept a motion to rezone the Park Village, Carrickmines, close to the N11 motorway, to district retail centre status despite the opposition of county manager Owen Keegan.

The motion was tabled by Fine Gael councillor Tom Joyce and Fianna Fáil councillor John Byrne and passed in November by a majority of two. Some councillors complained of excessive lobbying before the vote. District retail centre status increases the space available for retail development to 25,000square metres, 6,000 more than the site’s current zoning of neighbourhood centre.

The Park Village is being developed by Park Developments Ltd. Mr Gormley wrote to the council to express his concerns about the rezoning last year. A further letter was sent to the council last Friday as part of the final consultation phase for the Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Development Plan 2010-2016.

In it, the Department of the Environment on behalf of Mr Gormley expressed the Minister’s “serious concern that the council had failed to act on his previous advice and recommendation”.

The rezoning did not accord with the “hierarchy of retail centres in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown”, in the Greater Dublin Area Retail Strategy agreed by all planning authorities. The strategy would be “seriously compromised and undermined” if the rezoning went ahead. The rezoning would attract significant amounts of car-based traffic.

The department asked the council to indicate what steps it intended to take to address the Minister’s concerns.

“Failing a satisfactory response, the Minister will have to strongly consider whether further action is warranted, including the use of powers of direction under the Planning and Development Acts,” the letter said. The powers allow the Minister to order the council not to rezone lands.

The above documents can be downloaded from the links below:

• Janaury Student blog
  - A bit about the whether and a new years welcome message
  -  An Introduction to UCC’s next trip to Mizen Head for Landscape Character Assessments

• January E-zine
  -Whats to come from the IPI in the new year

THE NATIONAL Roads Authority has confirmed that the proposed route of the bypass of Slane village will pass some 500 metres “from the perimeter” of the buffer zone of the Brú na Bóinne Unesco World Heritage Site.

The road, which will be a dual carriageway, will have “the least impact” taking all factors into consideration, including the archaeology and heritage of the area, a spokesman said.

It will be 3.5 kilometres long and run to the east of the village, which is on the heavily used N2 linking Dublin with Derry and it has been the scene of at least 22 fatal traffic crashes in living memory.

Included in the scheme is a new bridge over the river Boyne which will be about 200 metres long.

The environmental impact statement has been published and submissions on it are being accepted by An Bord Pleanála, which will decide whether to grant permission.

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The preparation of the Draft Naas Town Development Plan 2011 – 2017 is currently underway with the Manager expected to present the Draft Plan to the Councillors in early February 2010. The Draft Plan will be put on public display in April 2010 with submissions being invited for a period of 10 weeks.

The Draft County Development Plan 2011 – 2017 is currently being prepared by the Manager and is expected to be presented to the Councillors in early Feburary 2010. The target date for the public disply of the Draft Plan is mid April 2010. Submissions will be invited by the Council for a period of 10 weeks.

Don’t Forget to get your submissions in before the 12th March. Need a Planner try The Irish Planning Institute Planner Search

NO NEW lands will be rezoned for housing in Dublin city until after 2017, under the new draft city development plan which has been released for public consultation.

Assistant city manager Michael Stubbs said there was already sufficient residentially zoned land to meet demand and that some land which had been zoned residential under the last development plan would be rezoned for other uses.

Undeveloped land which had been zoned solely for housing is now being considered for a newly created zoning “Z10A”. This zoning would be similar to the existing Z10 zoning which allows for mixed use development of residential, commercial and retail in urban centres, but would have lower densities.

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The new Draft Dublin City Development Plan 2011 – 2017 is officially on display now, with public consultation open. Written submissions will can be made up until 4:40PM on Friday, 12^thMarch 2010. All submissions or observations received during the above time period will be taken into consideration before the making of the Dublin City Development Plan 2011-2017.

The development plan has its own website which can be viewed at the following link: http://www.dublincitydevelopmentplan.ie

It is quiet interesting to note that on the website the council have prepared a number of videos detailing there key vision for the city. The authority have taken a different tack to completing the this development plan, a vision for 2030 has identified the steps it feels necessary to achieve this 2030 vision.

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A new six lane 25m pool for north county Dublin.  A shame though that the pool design appears not to be a full length “deep” pool, its a pity it isn’t because it could have been used as a competition pool. Enough about non planning matters.

Since this article was written there has been 2 further submissions objecting to the proposed leisure centre development. The grounds for there rejection can be summarized as follows:

1. Issues in realtion to direct overlooking of there properties from the bar/lounge area of the proposed development.
2. Noise issues in relation to the associated plant required for the operation of a swimming pool.
3. Noise issues in relation to the increased traffic that will be created by the new development.
4. The size of the members bar/lounge.
5. Issues in realtion to the drainage of the site and the potential for disruption of the drainage on their own lands due to the proposed construction of an attenuation pond for storm drainage.
6. Issues in relation to Water Supply in the local area being disrupted due to the large volumes of water needed for the operation of a swimming pool.

BALBRIGGAN Rugby Club and Swimworld Investments are awaiting a decision from Fingal County Council on planning permission for the long-awaited swimming pool development at the club grounds. Swimwor ld Investments (formerly Kingfisher), have combined with the club to apply for planning permission for the facility before Christmas and as the New Year breaks, the developers are hoping for a green light from developers.

So far, only one submission from the public has raised concerns about the development. Neighbours of the site, Eamonn and Phyllis Carew want reassurances that measures will be taken to avoid increasing the risk of flooding on their property, if the development goes ahead.

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AN EARTHQUAKE measuring 1.6 on the Richter scale struck Donegal on Thursday night.

The minor tremor struck at 7.30pm, with the epicentre located at Bridgend in the south of the Inishowen peninsula, the School of Cosmic Physics at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies confirmed yesterday.

The tremor was felt in Bridgend and Buncrana in Inishowen and westwards across Lough Swilly in the Fanad peninsula.

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MINISTER FOR the Environment John Gormley will express his “dismay” at a Cabinet meeting next week over remarks by Dublin city manager John Tierney on the controversial Poolbeg incinerator project.

Mr Tierney last week said the Minister “must be aware” that Dublin City Council had a statutory obligation to go ahead with the incinerator and that interference with the project could leave the State with a multimillion-euro compensation bill.

The incinerator site is in Mr Gormley’s own constituency of Dublin South East. As an opposition TD, he made a submission to An Bord Pleanála against the application for permission to build the facility. However, on becoming Minister, he was legally precluded from interfering in a statutory process that had already begun.

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