An Irish Planning Students Blog

AN BORD Pleanála has scuppered plans for the development of a historic demesne near Celbridge, Co Kildare, on the basis that it would compromise the setting of Castletown House – now maintained by the Office of Public Works (OPW).

Overturning a decision by Kildare County Council to approve plans by developers Devondale Ltd for 108 detached houses at Donaghcumper Demesne, the board said it “would seriously injure the amenities of the area and of property in the vicinity”.

In its ruling, the board noted that both Donaghcumper House and Castletown are protected structures and that it is an objective of the Kildare county plan to prohibit development in gardens or landscapes associated with such structures.

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LONG-RUNNING plans for a new town centre which straddles the border of counties Dublin and Wicklow have been approved by An Bord Pleanála.

The €2 billion development incorporates more then 900 new homes – including some 600 apartments, a hotel, leisure facilities, offices, a cinema, bars and more than 100 new shops.

Also envisaged is a greatly improved road link to the M11, and a major Office of Public Works flood protection scheme for the river Dargle.

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An Bord Pleanála has today refused the Dublin Port Company permission to implement an expansion plan for the port.

The company had applied to develop additional facilities with access to deepwater berths at the north eastern part of Dublin Port, off Alexandra Road through infilling some 95 acres.

The controversial plans had attracted more than 100 objections, including one from Dublin City Council calling them “premature”.

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EIRGRID HAS defended its proposal to build an interconnector in the northeast which would link electricity grids in the North and South.

Residents of the northeast, led by groups including the North East Pylon Pressure Group, have argued that large pylons and high-voltage overhead lines are not appropriate in the area.

More than 900 submissions have been made to An Bord Pleanála relating to the plan for some 140km of 400 kilovolt overhead line on lattice towers from Meath to Tyrone.
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AN BORD Pleanála has overturned the decision of Meath County Council to allow the construction of a business and technology park in the grounds of Carton House, one of Ireland’s most important Georgian mansions.

The joint venture between NUI Maynooth and Glashrooneen Ltd would “seriously injure the setting of Carton House” and would be contrary to the proper and sustainable development of the area, An Bord Pleanála said.

In its ruling An Bord Pleanála describes Carton House and its estate as “one of the most important elements of Ireland’s architectural, cultural and historic heritage” and as having “international significance”.

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AN EXISTING risk of flooding in Clontarf, Sandymount and Ringsend would be exacerbated by Dublin Port’s plans to infill 52 acres of Dublin Bay, a Bord Pleanála hearing heard yesterday.

Citing a range of expert opinions, including the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) 2003 report entitled Climate Change, Scenarios and Impacts for Ireland , the campaign group Dublin Bay Watch said the planting of 52 acres of “hard material” in Dublin Bay represented a “considerable flooding risk” in addition to that posed by rising sea levels.

At the resumed hearing yesterday, An Bord Pleanála senior inspector Brendan Wyse was told by Liam O’Dwyer that the range of expertise arrayed against the port company’s plan was extensive.

He cited from research by the EPA, UCC in collaboration with the Hydraulics and Marine Research Centre, as well as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, to emphasise the risk of more intense storms occurring more frequently.

Dublin, he said, was cited in a number of studies as being a low-lying coastal area which was “very seriously at risk” from flooding.

Fellow Dublin Bay Watch member Peter Bailey said the EPA report had concluded the impacts of “sea level rise will be most apparent in the major cities of Cork, Limerick, Dublin and Galway” and this was a serious problem where strategic infrastructure was located.

In a legal submission on behalf of Dublin Bay Watch and the Clontarf Residents’ Association, barrister Dónall Ó’Laoire said the infill was contrary to the EU birds directive, the EU habitats directive, the directive on environmental impact assessments, and proper planning and development.

Dublin Port Company has told the inquiry the increase in port capacity provided by the infill is a matter of strategic economic importance to the State.

IrishTimes

AN BORD Pleanála has deferred a key decision due to be have been delivered yesterday on the controversial Corrib gas onshore pipeline in north Mayo.

The appeals board told The Irish Times that Shell EP Ireland’s application to modify the gas onshore pipeline route was under “active consideration” during board meetings that took place from Wednesday to Friday of this week.

“There was no outcome,” a board spokesman said. “Further meetings will be held next week, and there will be an outcome in the week starting November 2nd,” he said.

The deferral is the second by the appeals board since the oral hearing earlier this year into the application for a new route and for compulsory acquisition orders to private land. A spokesman said this was due to the “complex nature of the case”.

The 19-day oral hearing chaired by inspector Martin Nolan considered the application under the Strategic Infrastructure Act.

The new route runs through special areas of conservation designated under the EU habitats directive and includes two river crossings.

The offshore pipeline was laid by the developers during the summer, and construction of the onshore gas terminal at Bellanaboy is nearing completion.

The previous pipeline route was not subject to planning, and consent to compulsory acquisition of private land by a private company was signed by former marine minister Frank Fahey under amended gas Acts.

Opposition to this on health and safety grounds resulted in the jailing of five Erris residents, known as the Rossport Five, for 94 days in 2005.

The Health and Safety Authority informed the appeals board at the outset of the oral hearing last May that it had no remit, as off-site gas pipelines are not controlled by the Control of Major Accident Hazard Regulations 2006.

AN BORD Pleanalá’s handsome looking annual report for 2008 contained no great surprises. The workload was down 16 per cent on the previous bumper year; there was a 20 per cent drop in the number of appeals dealt with in relation to one-off houses in rural areas and the percentage of local authority planning decisions appealed to the board showed an increase of 8.1 per cent compared to 6.7 per cent in 2007.

The rate of reversal of local planning authority decisions appealed showed a slight increase, 33 per cent in 2008 compared to 32 per cent in 2007.

The board met its statutory objective in dealing with appeals within 18 weeks in less than 50 per cent of cases – that doesn’t sound like something to boast about but the report sees it as a positive in that the previous year it only met the 18-week target in less than a quarter of the cases.

It says that “excessive and unsustainable zoning of land has been a contributor to the property bubble and its aftermath” and that “some of this land will have to be rezoned”.

Presenting the report, the chairperson of the board, John O’Connor, said that “it would be extremely short-sighted if there was a tendency to relax good planning standards in response to our current economic difficulties”. A reader from Mars might deduce from that that planning standards during the loadsamoney boom were fantastic. The number of ghost estates dotted around the country, the ugly holiday villages and empty apartment blocks tell a different story.

Source:  IrishTimes Article Link

ANY RELAXATION of planning standards in response to the recession – even for land that falls into the hands of the National Asset Management Agency (Nama) – would be “extremely shortsighted”, the chairman of An Bord Pleanála has said.

At a press briefing yesterday on the board’s 2008 annual report, John O’Connor also said the “excessive and unsustainable zoning of land” that contributed to the property bubble would have to be tackled by local authorities.

“If we are to return to realistic development planning, some of this land will have to be dezoned, and facing up to this has a part to play in deflating the bubble,” he said, adding that this would apply “irrespective of whether it’s in the hands of Nama or not”.

Mr O’Connor said there was nothing in the legislation establishing Nama that would change the need to obtain planning permission. He said that “the normal requirements will apply”.

“There can be no expectation that proper planning standards would not be applied to development proposals, even where the land is linked to distressed loans,” Mr O’Connor said. “Now, more than ever, we need to embrace the principles of good planning and sustainable development in order to prevent further deterioration of our environment, to respond to climate change [and] to maximise the return from expensive infrastructure investment.”

Mr O’Connor said the planning Bill now before the Oireachtas should ensure a “much more coherent and sustainable approach to zoning”. Anyone assessing property values in terms of development potential would now have to “look beyond the particular zoning” and focus on the availability of services as well as other planning issues such as density, height, impact on amenities and orderly urban expansion.

Mr O’Connor expressed concern that developers may be tempted to return to lower density development as a “safer option” in the present market and warned that such applications, particularly in major urban centres, would be “critically assessed” by the board.

The recession has had an impact on An Bord Pleanála’s workload, with a drop of more than 30 per cent in the intake of appeals in the past year. As a result, the number of cases on hand had almost halved to 1,550 and “routine delays” may soon be eliminated.

In 2008, however, “severe workload pressure” meant that the board met the statutory objective of determining appeals within 18 weeks in only 23 per cent of cases – down from 48 per cent in 2007. Last month, Mr O’Connor said the figure was 36 per cent.

Of 5,801 cases determined, appeals by developers against refusals had a 28 per cent success rate, while 39 per cent of third- party appeals were upheld.

The proportion of local authority decisions appealed rose from 6.7 per cent to 8.1 per cent.

From the introduction of the Strategic Infrastructure Act in 2007 to the end of last month, the board dealt with 137 requests from project sponsors for “pre-application consultations” on projects that were “too vague” in some cases, according to Mr O’Connor.

Of the 137 requests for projects to be processed under the Act, 33 qualified for its “fast-track” planning treatment, 46 were not regarded by the board as strategic infrastructure cases, and 18 were withdrawn or otherwise concluded.

Of 15 formal applications for permission received under the Act, eight have been concluded with four granted, three refused and one withdrawn.

Mr O’Connor said the public-service reform agenda must include rationalisation of the number of local authorities with planning functions – currently 88 county, city and town councils.

Source:  IrishTimes.com

“Many of these authorities have administrative areas that are much too small and fractured to constitute meaningful planning units,” he said, adding that he would not favour “one big monolithic planning authority”.

AN BORD PLEANÁLA is to reopen a planning hearing into Dublin port proposals to infill 52 acres of Dublin bay.

The hearing was suspended last month after it emerged the board’s advisers HR Wallingford, had undertaken work on plans for Bremore port which is a potential rival for Dublin’s port’s expansion plans.

In a letter received by the parties to the hearing yesterday, the board said it did not accept there was a conflict of interest.

However, the board said it would be changing its advisers and dispensing with the services of HR Wallingford.

The hearing will reopen when new advisers read themselves into the brief.

The issue of conflict arose after it emerged during the inquiry that HR Wallingford had provided advice in 2004 to Drogheda Port Company which is planning a deep water port at Bremore, in north Co Dublin.

In deciding there was no conflict of interest the board noted the HR Wallingford adviser assigned to the case commenced employment with the company only in 2007. It also noted that in recent years HR Wallingford had also worked directly or indirectly for both Dublin Port Company and Dublin City Council.

The board said it will now appoint a new expert to replace the adviser but will reconvene the oral hearing under inspector Brendan Wyse as soon as feasible.

Welcoming the news, chairman of Dublin Bay Watch, Gerry Breen, said it was ‘‘keen to put our side of the argument to the hearing”.

Source:  IrishTimes – www.irishtimes.com