Galway City Council planners under fire from Kingston Cross backers

From this week’s Galway City Tribune – The backers of a proposed €30 million shopping complex off the Western Distributor Road have accused Galway City Council’s planning department of resisting any form of development on the lands and claimed feedback they received was “not fit for purpose”.

In a scathing attack on city planners, the design team for ‘Kingston Cross’ have told An Bord Pleanála there was a “hostile reception” to their proposals for the 17-acre greenfield site opposite Aldi and the new Lidl which is currently under construction.

And they said that at a meeting with planners prior to lodging the planning application, some people present admitted they had only just looked at the plans that morning.

The application for the retail centre – with a Tesco, Decathlon and nine smaller shop units, as well as a café/restaurant, medical units, covered sports court and civic plaza – were turned down by the Council last month. They branded the design “poor” and said it would cause a traffic hazard, and also claimed that they expressed concerns at the pre-application meeting which were not taken on board.

That decision has now been appealed to An Bord Pleanála by the project backers, Lioncor Developments, a company ultimately owned by Alanis Capital and the US vulture fund Oaktree Capital, which also owns Gateway Retail Park on the opposite side of the Western Distributor Road.

The design team said in their appeal: “We understand that the subject lands attained their current zoning through a vote of the Council’s elected members contrary to the advice of the planning department, which might account in some part for the hostile reception our plans received at pre-application consultation. Our experience during the engagement process demonstrated in no uncertain terms that the planning department seems to resist agreeing to any form of development on the subject lands.”
This is a shortened preview version of this article. To read the rest of the story, and on the appeal from Lioncor and from local environmentalists see this week’s Galway City Tribune. You can buy a digital edition HERE.