The High Court has rejected a challenge to planning permission for a large craft and retail development at Laragh in Co Wicklow.
Joe O’Neill, a businessman living close to the site, sought to quash An Bord Pleanála’s September 2005 decision granting permission to Blarney Woollen Mills for a three-storey development at Laragh East.
The original proposal covered 3,257 square metres, including 1,806 square metres of retail space. Wicklow County Council granted permission in December 2004 despite O’Neill’s objections concerning scale, traffic, visual impact, planning policy and the character of the area.
O’Neill appealed to An Bord Pleanála. Its inspector, Oznur Yucel-Finn, recommended refusal, concluding that the development was too large, would damage visual amenities and was out of character with the surrounding area and protected structures. She alternatively suggested reducing the floor space to no more than 600 square metres.
The Board instead asked the developer to reduce the retail element by 300 square metres. Revised plans were submitted and permission was ultimately granted for a 2,957-square-metre development, subject to 21 conditions.
The judicial review before Mr Justice Hedigan was confined to whether the Board had adequately explained why it rejected the inspector’s recommendation.
The judge held that it had. He said planning law required the Board to state its main reasons, but not to produce a detailed judgment matching the inspector’s report. Its decision identified the reduced floor area, natural screening and landscaping as reasons for concluding that the development would not seriously injure local amenities.
The court also considered conditions dealing with signs, landscaping, trees, underground service cables and external finishes. Read together with the decision, these showed that the Board had addressed the inspector’s concerns about visual impact.
The ruling leaves the planning permission in place. The court did not revisit the merits of the development itself or the procedural grounds on which O’Neill had not been granted leave.