Here’s a summary of where we are as 2021 gets under way.
Most visitors to this site know only too well that in 2019 Bulloch Harbour Preservation Association lodged an application for a High Court Judicial Review of the An Bord Pleanala decision to grant planning permission for the former Western Marine site. In applying for the JR, our legal team set out a lengthy statement of grounds, detailing multiple deficiencies in the ABP decision.
In July 2020 following routine adjournments and after delays owing to the Covid pandemic, ABP through their solicitors conceded our case without the Judicial Review ever having taken place. This concession quashed ABP’s planning permission. We subsequently learnt that ABP’s concession related to “Ground 3” which relates to deficiencies in the planning application relating to the Habitats directive and sections of the Planning and Development Act. An Bord Pleanala did not concede other very important aspects of our case, for example the evidence of the vulnerability of the site to flooding and wave-overtopping. The concession by ABP means that the High Court now requires ABP to reconsider their decision.
ABP has therefore re-opened the case with a new reference and the planning process is now, once again, live. This was, in essence, signalled by the flurry of correspondence in November 2020 to all those who had made observations to ABP in 2018 – as explained in the previous post. A number of scenarios could now ensue and speculation is, at this stage, pointless. What is now clear is that the matter is far from settled. Keep watching this site for more news. Thank you all for your continuing support.
Bullock Harbour 