The High Court has upheld a Dublin resident’s challenge to a BusConnects stop proposed directly outside her 19th-century cottage on the Malahide Road corridor.
Áine Kelly challenged An Bord Pleanála’s January 2024 approval of the Clongriffin to City Centre Core Bus Corridor Scheme. Her home opens directly onto the public footpath, with no front garden or wall separating its windows and door from the proposed stop.
Kelly did not seek to block the wider bus corridor. Instead, she asked the Board to require the National Transport Authority to move this particular stop. She said passengers could congregate immediately outside her windows and front door around the clock, affecting privacy, security, ventilation and access to her home.
The proposed stop is expected to serve several routes, including services operating over a 24-hour period, with up to 30 buses an hour suggested at peak times.
The Board’s inspector acknowledged what she described as the “potential annoyance” of having the stop beside the cottages but concluded that the impact did not justify altering the scheme and that reasonable alternatives had been considered.
Ms Justice Emily Farrell held that this substantially mischaracterised Kelly’s case. Her submissions concerned direct privacy and security impacts on a dwelling whose rooms rely on windows opening directly onto the footpath, rather than mere inconvenience.
The judge also found that the NTA’s bus-stop methodology, although relevant to efficient operation of the network, did not itself address those privacy and security concerns. The Board had not adequately explained why those concerns did not justify moving the stop to a less optimal location.
The court therefore upheld Kelly’s challenge on the adequacy of reasons. It did not rule that the entire Clongriffin scheme should be quashed. Instead, the judge proposed cancelling only the approval for works at the row of cottages containing Kelly’s home, subject to further submissions on the precise order.