The High Court has refused Friends of Ardee Bog’s application to quash An Bord Pleanála decisions that a proposed N52 Ardee Bypass did not require a full Environmental Impact Assessment report or a Natura Impact Statement.
In a judgment delivered on 14 May 2024, Ms Justice Miriam O’Regan said the applicant had not shown that the Board’s screening determinations were flawed. She found that the challenge did not identify a properly particularised manifest error and was unsupported by scientific evidence from the applicant. The court refused certiorari, the remedy sought to quash the decisions.
Louth County Council had asked the Board to determine whether the proposed 4.5km road required the two assessments. The project includes four junctions, two bridges over the Rivers Dee and Gara, and pedestrian and cycle facilities. The Board’s October 2021 decisions directed the council not to prepare an EIA report or a Natura Impact Statement. The judgment says those decisions did not grant development consent.
Friends of Ardee Bog argued, among other matters, that earlier hedgerow clearance along the northern bypass route should have been assessed, and that the Board had not adequately considered effects on birds, flooding and protected sites. The judge noted the screening material and inspector’s report before the Board, including surveys, NPWS information on curlew sightings, and assessments of potential effects on nearby European sites. She rejected the challenge, finding the Board had sufficient information to make its determinations. She also said the Board had authority to make the screening determination under the applicable regulations.
The court separately recorded an agreed declaration concerning the State respondents. It declared that, before conservation objectives for the Stabannan-Braganstown SPA were published, the second and third named respondents had failed to have sufficiently specific conservation objectives in place, contrary to EU law. The judgment does not identify those respondents by name in the declaration.
The parties’ submissions on costs remained outstanding. The judge allowed them 14 days from delivery of the electronic judgment to file written submissions of up to 1,000 words; if none were filed, no order for costs would be made.