The High Court has dismissed Grassridge Limited’s challenge to Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council’s refusal to extend a planning permission for 15 homes on the former Dalkey Lodge Nursing Home site in Dalkey, County Dublin.
In a judgment delivered on 25 November 2024, Mr Justice David Holland rejected Grassridge’s application to quash the council’s 27 August 2024 decision. The court said the proceedings would be listed on 16 December for final orders. It did not make those final orders in this judgment.
The permission, granted on appeal in May 2019, was due to expire on 7 September 2024. Grassridge applied in July for a two-year extension. The council refused, finding it was not satisfied that substantial works had been carried out during the permission period, as required by section 42 of the Planning and Development Act 2000.
Construction began in April 2024. The judgment records that Grassridge had demolished the nursing home and removed more than 5,000 cubic metres of granite bedrock. The work was valued at about €1.125 million. By the permission’s expiry, foundations had been excavated for Block A, but none had been cast; excavation and service works had also been carried out.
Grassridge argued that the council had misinterpreted the legal test, made errors of fact, failed to consider its submissions or give adequate reasons, and acted unfairly and irrationally. The company also relied on the scale and value of the completed work and the financial consequences of losing the permission.
The judge held that whether work is “substantial” must be assessed in the context of the nature and extent of the whole development permitted. That was an evaluative planning judgment for the council, reviewable by the court for irrationality rather than for whether the judge would have reached the same conclusion. He found the council’s approach lawful and its reasons adequate in the context of the application.
The court also rejected the arguments about procedural fairness and irrationality. It said the work had not progressed beyond excavations for foundations and services, and that the council’s conclusion that it was not substantial in relation to the permitted development was not irrational. The judge stressed that the court was reviewing the lawfulness of the decision-making process, not deciding the extension application on its merits.
Grassridge had made a second extension application in September 2024, which the council also refused. The judgment notes that a separate challenge to that refusal was adjourned pending this decision.