Since June 2008 The Dublin Docklands Development Authority (DDDA) have been inviting local residents, businesses and other interested parties to various open days to view and discuss the Docklands Development Authority Draft Plan for the Poolbeg Peninsula.
The Committee of Sandymount and Merrion Residents’ Association recently called an EGM to discuss their reaction to the Plans.
SAMRA was able to obtain Joe McCarthy, Chartered Engineer, noted for his analysis of the electronic voting debacle, as the guest speaker to show the residents what is envisaged by the DDDA for the Poolbeg Peninsula.
Joe McCarthy was a member of a special interest group on the environmental consequences of the plans. Joe reported that that questions were asked without adequate replies and that some of the planning details were not laid out and were said by the DDDA to be still not finalised.
The planning process, he said, involved taking in concerns of those at these meetings, chaired by Mr Cormac Russell of the DDDA, then digesting the various concerns followed by producing a scheme which goes before the Minister of the Environment, currently John Gormley TD, for approval or rejection around February 2009 after some City Council consultation.
If the plans are approved, the DDDA will then be the sole planning authority for the area.
Joe McCarthy provided a splendid explanation of what is envisaged by DDDA in an hour-long seminar with slides of the plans and the impact it will have for Sandymount and its environs.
He explained that this stage now was the only opportunity for the residents to react to the proposals, as there was no appeal available to An Bord Pleanála.
At the end of the presentation the SAMRA environment spokesperson Lorna Kelly told how they had written previously to the Minister seeking an extension of the Special Protection Areas (SPA) without response and had complained to the European Union on the grounds that the SPA was under threat from proposed developments.
The people attending the EGM were asked to make their feelings known by a show of hands approving four motions before the meeting to be put to Minister Gormley.
1. We request the Minister for Environment, Heritage and Local Government to take immediate action to ensure that all lands which were unused and undeveloped as of January 2007, on the Poolbeg peninsula, south of a line drawn from South Bank Road eastwards to the seaward side of the Sewage works and lying east of Kilsaran Cement plant are zoned as public open spaces and parkland, as originally promised as far back as 1963, together with the Roadstone causeway and the grass area on the western side.
2. We request the Minister for Environment, Heritage and Local Government to include the land area on the Poolbeg peninsula used by wild birds, as shown on the map already lodged with him by SAMRA, to be included in the previously-designated Sandymount Strand and Tolka Estuary SPA area, in accordance with the requirements of EU Birds and Habitats Directives.
3. We request the Minister for Environment, Heritage and Local Government not to approve any plan, proposal for the Poolbeg peninsula by any body, over which he exercises some control, without his prior consultation with representatives of SAMRA, or which conflict with the motions agreed by residents of Sandymount and Merrion EGM held on the 20th October 2008.
4. We request the Minister for Environment, Heritage and Local Government to direct Dublin Docklands Development Authority and Dublin City Council to avoid all further development on the Poolbeg peninsula land that was reclaimed from the sea with commercial, industrial and municipal waste, between 1963 and 1981, other than open space permitted, in accordance with the development guidelines of June 2007 and the Draft Flood Risk guidelines of September 2008 issued by his department.
The floor approved the motions and a letter has been sent to the Minister.