The High Court has ordered the indicative road route through areas MP2 and MP3 to be quashed from the Meath County Development Plan 2021–2027, after previously finding that the plan lacked adequate reasons for the road.
In a judgment delivered on 18 November 2022, Mr Justice Humphreys settled the form of the order and ruled on costs in the judicial review brought by Hickwell Limited and Hickcastle Limited against Meath County Council. The court ordered certiorari removing, for the purpose of being quashed, the route shown on Land Use Zoning Map Sheet 13(a), the Dunboyne-Clonee-Pace Land Use Zoning Map.
The judge said his earlier judgment, in July 2022, had decided in principle to grant relief over the route, which passes through the applicants’ lands. The present judgment addressed the precise order and costs; it did not revisit the earlier conclusions.
The applicants argued that the order should cover the entire indicative route, rather than only the section crossing their lands, because the earlier reasons finding concerned the need for the road as a whole. The council supported limiting the order to the applicants’ lands. Other affected landowners were notified. Counsel for the Ward family opposed the road, while other private parties expressed general opposition; the judgment said none objected to the proposed wider order. Solicitors for Runways said they would not get involved.
The judgment described three sections: a northern section through the applicants’ lands with no development consent; the section through their lands agreed to be quashed; and a south-eastern section through lands owned by Facebook/Runways, where the road had been consented to. The judge said quashing the development-plan alignment would not affect existing consents.
The court did not order remittal. The judge said the council had not sought it and discussed the statutory process for varying a development plan. He said no immediate practical problem requiring interim court action arose on the facts.
On costs, the judge found the applicants had not won every argument, so the provision for wholly successful parties did not apply. But he said they had won on four substantive points, including the lack of reasons for the need and indicative route of the road and disproportionate interference with property. The case would have taken two days even if they had pursued only successful points, so he declined to discount their costs. The court awarded the applicants the costs of the proceedings, including the leave application, substantive hearing, written submissions and the later hearing on the order and costs.