The High Court has ordered inspection and sampling at a Murphy Concrete quarry in Hollywood as part of a dispute over stone used in the Drumnigh Wood housing development in Portmarnock. It adjourned the developers’ request to inspect three Roadstone quarries until Roadstone files its defence; the judge did not reject that request.
Ballymore Residential Limited and Crosswinds Cottage Limited, the developers, sought access to quarries to help identify the source of stone in houses where homeowners allege structural damage from pyritic heave. The application was made under Order 50, rule 4 of the Rules of the Superior Courts, which allows inspection and sampling of property where necessary or expedient to obtain evidence.
The estate comprises 145 houses built in three phases between 2001 and 2007. The judgment records that Roadstone supplied up to 80% of the stone, Murphy Concrete about 16%, and William Miley Limited about 4%. The developers had no records showing which supplier’s stone was used beneath each individual house. More than 30 homeowners had issued proceedings alleging defects linked to pyrite. The judgment also refers to about 50 earlier houses remediated under a defects guarantee and to more than 80 claims connected with the development overall.
The developers’ experts said tests of subfloor material showed reactive framboidal pyrite and argued that comparing samples with quarry stone could identify its source. Roadstone’s expert had stated that some tested samples did not come from Roadstone quarries. Roadstone disputed the timing, scope and method of the proposed inspection, and submitted that any problem might arise from how its products were used. Murphy Concrete questioned whether the proposed testing could reliably establish provenance.
Justice Murphy found that the developers were at an evidential disadvantage because the suppliers had access to samples from affected houses while the developers could not trace each delivery to a particular home. She concluded that inspection of Murphy Concrete’s Hollywood quarry was a less intrusive first step: it was no longer a working quarry and was being used for landfill. The court considered that identifying stone from two of the three suppliers could help identify the third source.
The order permits inspection and sampling at the Hollywood quarry to obtain evidence. The court adjourned the Roadstone quarry application pending clarification of the dispute through Roadstone’s defence and said it could revisit the issue if necessary. It also observed that resolving the developers’ dispute with the suppliers first might reduce costs and improve the handling of the other claims, but made no order on that suggestion.