The High Court has quashed An Bord Pleanála’s refusal of proposed amendments to the North Lotts and Grand Canal Dock Strategic Development Zone planning scheme and sent the application back to the board for reconsideration.
Dublin City Council brought the judicial review after the board decided in March 2021 not to approve the amendments. The parties agreed that the board’s decision and a related direction should be quashed. Their dispute was over how far back the process should be restarted: the board sought remittal to September 2019, while the council argued it should return to the point immediately before the board’s March 2021 direction.
Humphreys J ruled that the process should resume immediately before the March 16, 2021 direction. The court also made, by consent, an order quashing the board’s formal decision of March 23, 2021 and its March 16 direction. The judgment does not approve the planning amendments or determine what the board must decide next.
The dispute about the restart point centred on the environmental screening undertaken during the application. The council argued that the board had screened out the need for a full Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) in 2019, and could not use the 2021 decision to reopen that earlier stage. The board argued that it had failed to make an SEA screening determination and sought a restart before the public consultation process.
The judge concluded that the board had implicitly accepted the inspector’s 2019 view that a full SEA was unnecessary. The board had directed public consultation without requiring a full assessment, which the court said was consistent with screening out the need for one. The judgment also noted that the board’s 2021 materials appeared to misunderstand the earlier process and the council’s screening documents.
The court rejected the board’s request to unwind the consultation process, citing the evidence, the board’s pleadings and the risk of duplicating work and causing further delay. The judgment noted that the board had taken more than a year to issue its 2021 direction after receiving a supplementary inspector’s report.
The application now returns to the board at the stage immediately before its March 2021 direction. The court did not predict whether the amendments will ultimately be approved.