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Concern over number of planning reports overruled

Thursday, 15 May 2008

Concern has been expressed that An Bord Pleanála is overturning too many of the recommendations made by its own inspectors when they are ruling on planning developments.
According to figures obtained by a TD on the Southside, the planning body is rejecting the recommendations of their own professional staff in one case in every eight.
A written reply to a Dáil question submitted by Dublin South Central TD Mary Upton (Lab) reveals that in 2007, of 4,611 appeals taken by An Bord Pleanala, the board set aside their inspectors’ reports in 603 cases. That represents 13 per cent, which is an increase from nine per cent in 2001. Deputy Upton cited two cases in her own constituency where the planning appeals board overturned their own inspectors’ reports.
These include the Player Wills site on South Circular Road and the former Tayto plant at Mount Tallant on Harold’s Cross Road, where massive mixed-use developments were the subject of appeals recently.
In both cases, inspectors with the board recommended against the developments going ahead, and in both cases the board set aside those recommendations.
A number of decisions in relation to projects of national or regional significance, particularly those relating to "national policy", have caused public controversy in recent years.
Last year, the board granted planning permission for the new e350 million Lansdowne Road stadium, which had been vehemently opposed by local residents.
An oral hearing was conducted in 2006 by an inspector who recommended that permission for the scheme be refused because there were better alternatives to the Lansdowne Road site and because the stadium would have a negative impact on residents.
The board rejected his report. One of the main reasons they cited was the fact that the stadium was part of national policy as it was included in the national development plan.
Another controversial case in Dún Laoghaire Rathdown saw the board overturning the recommendations of another inspector who presided over the oral hearing on the Monkstown Ring Road.
The e15 million road, connecting the Stillorgan Park/Carysfort Avenue junction with Deansgrange Road via Newtown Park, required the demolition of Yankee Terrace, a row of 11 late 19th-century cottages, and five properties on Newtownpark Avenue and Annaville Terrace.
It was approved in June 2006 after an oral hearing despite a strong recommendation from the inspector in that case to reject it.
Deputy Upton said the rejection of an inspector’s report would be akin to the board of a hospital overturning a doctor’s recommendation that a patient undergo a particular operation.
“The An Bord Pleanála system was designed so that the bulk of the analysis and investigation on each appeal would be carried out by the professional staff, led by the qualified inspectors, and that the board itself would accept the recommendations unless some significant error or other was made,” she said.
“If the board finds fault with one recommendation in eight, then there is clearly something wrong.”
A spokesman for An Bord Pleanála refused to comment on the matter.
He said: “The board would like to point out that in any appeal where the recommendation of an inspector is not accepted, the board gives a written statement as to why it did not accept the recommendation.
“The written statement is available on the file and on the internet under board direction.”

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