[Article] Roche overturns 'crazy' rezonings

Victor

http://home.eircom.net/content/unison/national/9157091?view=Eircomnet

Roche overturns 'crazy' rezonings
From:The Irish Independent
Friday, 27th October, 2006

THE Government made a dramatic move yesterday towards tackling the blight of urban sprawl.

In an unprecedented clampdown, a council was ordered to overturn dozens of rezonings.

And Environment Minister Dick Roche warned others they would face similar curbs.

It signals a significant block on the free-for-all planning that has allowed developments to spurt up in inappropriate places where there are hopelessly inadequate road, water, school and shopping services.

Mr Roche heavily criticised the "irresponsible madness" of Laois County Council in allowing so many houses to be built in such a short space of time.

He said such haphazard planning would destroy villages and towns and build up social and infrastructural problems for years to come.

He warned councils if they allowed some of the country's prettiest villages to be turned into vast housing estates he would intervene again.

It is the first time the emergency ministerial power, under Section 31 of the Planning and Development Act, has been used to scupper an agreed local authority development plan.

The council will now have to go back to the drawing board after the Government struck down the widescale rezoning of land for development around 24 Laois villages.

The action came because of fears that the villages affected by the "irresponsible" rezoning had inadequate infrastructure to cope with a massive increase in population. The move has wiped out potential profits for affected landowners in Laois running into hundreds of millions of euro.

They stood to make massive windfall profits from the agreed rezonings which have now been revoked by the ministerial order.

Development land in Laois zoned for housing can fetch up to €400,000 an acre, depending on location, compared with just €15,000-23,000 for agricultural land.

Mr Roche said yesterday that existing householders and new owners living in these villages faced inadequate water, sewage or school facilities if the plan, which involved dramatically increasing their population, had been permitted.

It would have created a new generation of long-distance commuters consigned to a desperately poor quality of life, the minister told the Irish Independent yesterday.

At the moment, there was enough land rezoned in Laois to cater for the entire region for another 15 years and the rezonings were only benefiting "a few landowners", he said.

Mr Roche said if Laois councillors - the majority of whom are Fine Gael - were not prepared to do their job properly, he would do it for them.

"I cannot stand over bad planning. It is the families who live there and those that will move in that will suffer," he said. "I am sending out a clear message that I am not going to tolerate bad planning. We should have learned the lessons of the past.

"This is madness and is grossly irresponsible. . . . They were planning to turn some of the prettiest villages in the entire country into vast dormitory ones for commuters and create communities which would have to wait a generation for the necessary infrastructure."

Slammed

The Laois plan would have increased the county's population from 80,000 to more than 150,000.

The villages affected are: Arles, Attanagh, Ballacolla, Ballinakill, Ballybrittas, Ballyfin, Ballylynan, Ballyroan, Borris-in-Ossory, Camross, Castletown, Clonaslee, Clough, Coolrain, Cullahill, Emo, Errill, Killeshin, Newtown-Doonane, Rosenallis, Shanahoe, the Swan, Timahoe and Vicarstown.

The move was slammed by Fine Gael general election candidate Charlie Flanagan, a former TD, who claimed the decision was politically motivated.

Michael Lalor (FG), cathaoirleach of the council, said most of the rescinded rezonings had not been supported by Fianna Fail councillors and he also believed the minister's decision was politically motivated.

"These were zoned with the best of intentions," he said. "We have never witnessed anything like this and I don't know what's at the back of it. All those villages will be developed and we were putting things in order to allow that happen."

Treacy Hogan and Paul Melia

murphaph

Wow, good news in isolation but this is the same Minster Roche who 'relaxed' planning guidleines just a year or so ago!! We NEED tight planning control.

secret_squirrel

How about something closer to dublin ffs!

Chris_533976

Stop the Cobh rezoning madness. 93 hectares have been rezoned for estates, not one road or infrastructure upgrade. No bus service to anywhere, just the (dodgy) train to Cork.

Lennoxschips

That's all part of the Cork Area Strategic "Plan". The greatest joke to come out of Cork since Bill O'Herlihy.

Danno

That was a fairly good plan. Typical polithicks though.

D'Peoples Voice

Danno wrote:

That was a fairly good plan. Typical polithicks though.

A fairly good plan, just how many of these villages would have an adequate amount of social services such as water, sanitation, policing, schools, libraries, swimming pools, retail facilites, amenities in general for young people such as all weather pitches/tennis courts,adequate public transport, enough employment such that people would not have to commute OUT of these villages and cause traffic congestion on our already overcrowded roads.
Arles, Attanagh, Ballacolla, Ballinakill, Ballybrittas, Ballyfin, Ballylynan, Ballyroan, Borris-in-Ossory, Camross, Castletown, Clonaslee, Clough, Coolrain, Cullahill, Emo, Errill, Killeshin, Newtown-Doonane, Rosenallis, Shanahoe, the Swan, Timahoe and Vicarstown.
these places are villages and making them into small towns is crazy! Especially when Port Laoise can still take another 60,000 - 80,000 people.

ClockWorkOrange

This would have been great news 8 years ago.. its too late now, you should see the state of limerick.. They have ugly cheap housing estates in the most inappropriate places.. The charm of the country side is all but ruined at this stage..

I blame the dumb-assed buyers for being willing to sell them selves into 30 years of financial slavery for a cheap badly built house in the middle of no where..

Do these people have any foresight what so ever? I came back to Ireland after a couple of years away and i was shocked..