Council to vote on Glen Ding rezoning

A proposal to rezone the historically and archaeologically important Glen Ding area in Blessington for quarrying is to be decided by Wicklow County Council today.

Councillors will vote on the adoption of a new Blessington Local Area Plan in which council planners propose to rezone much of Glen Ding for "extractive industries".

The land is owned by Roadstone which has been lobbying members of the county council to support the proposed change.

The wooded hillside is recognised as a fortified outpost of Mac Torcaill, the last Viking ruler of Dublin, and contains a number of recorded monuments.

A previous attempt by the council to rezone Glen Ding in 1996 was opposed by 1,415 submissions and supported by just one. The council went ahead and rezoned the land but this was struck down by the High Court in 1998 after a campaign of opposition from the Blessington Heritage Trust among others.

In a separate development, the Comptroller and Auditor General criticised the method by which the Department of Energy sold the lands to Roadstone in 1991, without advertising for a public competition.

That sale is now being investigated by the Moriarty Tribunal which has recently been in contact with the parties to the sale. The tribunal is investigating the affairs of former Taoiseach Mr Charles Haughey, particularly in relation to his dealings with Mr Des Traynor, who was non-executive chairman of Cement Roadstone Holdings in 1991.

Commenting on the latest move to rezone Glen Ding, Mr Frank Corcoran, president of An Taisce, yesterday said the new proposal defied belief. He said the site was important as a hilltop defence commanding views out over the plains of Leinster and contained Bronze Age artefacts as well as the listed monuments.

Although the current proposal has created an area of deciduous trees in Glen Ding for conservation, he said locals claim that it is essentially the same plan as that overturned by the High Court in 1998. At the time, the State was selling about 30 State forests, but Glen Ding was the only forest not to involve a public tender process.

Roadstone said it had acquired the land at Glen Ding in an "arm's-length transaction" and had paid a full price. "The sale and purchase has been investigated by the Comptroller and Auditor General and the Public Accounts Committee, and neither investigation found any evidence of any impropriety by the company."

The company repeatedly said it would be happy to co-operate with any investigation by a competent body.

Ms Deirdre de Búrca, a Green Party member of Wicklow County Council, said the company had not provided satisfactory answers to the Oireachtas Committee on the Environment, regarding illegally dumped material on its lands at Dillonsdown, adjacent to Glen Ding.

She said she would oppose Roadstone expanding its quarrying operations until the company had satisfactorily answered questions about the illegal dumps.

The rezoning has also been strongly opposed by Labour councillor Mr Tommy Cullen and other Labour members of the council as well as the Minister of State for Europe, Wicklow TD Mr Dick Roche.

Speaking at the weekend, Mr Roche said councillors must consider carefully the future of Glen Ding when voting on the matter at their monthly meeting. The council should not contemplate enlarging in any way the area of Glen Ding woods which is available for extractive industry zoning, he said.

Fianna Fáil councillor Ms Eleanor Roche has tabled a motion seeking to delete the rezoning from the Blessington Area Plan.