Councillors claim ‘outside influences’ playing too big a role in planning process

County councillors have expressed concerns that ‘outside influences’ are playing too great a part in the planning process.

At a meeting of the Athenry Oranmore Municipal District, one councillor pointed to the Galway City Ring Road as a prime example.

Cllr Jim Cuddy (Ind) said the project – which was granted permission by An Bord Pleanála – had already cost an inordinate amount of money to get to the planning stage and was now tied up again due to judicial review.

He said this was having a significant economic impact on Galway and had left homeowners along the controversial road’s route in ‘limbo’.

Cllr Cuddy reserved sharp criticism for Friends of the Irish Environment who are taking judicial review against An Bord Pleanála’s decision to grant permission.

“When you hear of Friends of the Irish Environment, which is based in Cork, objecting to a project in Galway, it begs the question if the tail is wagging the dog.

“The sooner the better legislation is brought in for people that are objecting from outside an area can’t . . . if it’s local people, that’s fair enough and that’s democracy,” said Cllr Cuddy.

Cllr Liam Carroll (FG) said another example was a petition which he believed had attracted signatures from far outside the area it related to.

The Connacht Tribune understands he was referring to an online petition seeking that councillors remove from the new County Development Plan a proposal to allow development 15 metres from the shoreline in Bearna. Cllr Carroll said the number of signatories suggested that 80% of the area’s population had signed.

“Organisations outside the county seem to be having an impact, not only on the Ring Road.

“We have got to be very careful with online petitions. I know in Oranmore, we had an online petition last year where people from Chicago, Vancouver and Perth in Australia had completed it,” said Cllr Carroll.

Cllr Shelly Herterich Quinn (FF) said they should be careful, too, not to exclude the voices of potential tourists and said: “I would hate to be putting them down.”

Cllr James Charity (Ind) said while the planning system required an overhaul, people were entitled to their viewpoint and to make representations to councillors.

He said major infrastructure projects in Galway had suffered serious delays due to these objections, however, and questioned if addresses could be verified in future Council submission processes.

“I don’t have any issue with representations being made to me . . . we’ve all experienced it, and our city colleagues in particular, with regard to what happened in Salthill [with the proposed temporary cycleway] have experienced it much more acutely.

“There is a problem in some of these submissions coming from further afield and maybe as a verification in these submission processes – in view of what happened in Salthill – we could look at how certain surveys are done and what has to be provided, whether that’s a phone number, address or whatever,” said Cllr Charity.