Donabate locals withdraw their High Court case against An Bord Pleanála

A local campaign group in Donabate has withdrawn its High Court judicial review taken against An Bord Pleanála.

DP Crossroads had last month sought a review of the board’s decision to grant planning permission to Glenveagh Living Limited for the second phase of a major housing development at Ballymastone.

The group argued that a community facility should have been provided by Glenveagh in the first phase, in accordance with Donabate’s local area plan, before the board granted permission for the second phase.

The case was withdrawn by the campaign on 10 April, court records show.

That clears the way for Glenveagh to proceed with building the project’s phase two, which includes 364 homes.

After DP Crossroads filed the judicial review on 10 March, Fingal county councillors split over the action.

At the March monthly meeting, independent Councillor Jimmy Guerin said the DP Crossroads activists, with the support of local councillors, were delaying the delivery of these houses.

It was a way of putting pressure on the council to deliver community infrastructure by halting the development of the second phase of the housing scheme, as well as a major sports hub on council-owned lands, Guerin claimed.

The matter came up again at the less tense April meeting of the full council on Monday, during a discussion on another judicial review across the Broadmeadow estuary in Malahide.

Chief Executive AnnMarie Farrelly said she was pleased to see the High Court’s decision to dismiss a challenge against Fingal County Council’s planned pedestrianisation of New Street in Malahide last week.

The planning permission was delayed almost three years by the legal challenge, she said. “So good to see that out of the courts.”

The council is now moving immediately to complete the detailed design of the public realm changes in Malahide, a council press release issued on Tuesday said. The €6 million project is expected to take 16 months, it said.

Meanwhile, in the council chamber on Monday, Guerin, the independent councillor, used the opportunity to query DP Crossroads’ review of the Ballymastone project, saying the case was struck out on Friday.

Was the council paying anything to discharge the DP Crossroads committee members’ costs, he asked, “including our councillors, or was it just the builder who paid the costs?”

The council didn’t contribute anything in relation to any settlement of that judicial review, said Farrelly, the council CEO.

There was a small amount of costs that the council did incur through the engagement of the council for the judicial review, she said. “But we did agree to the settlement without seeking any of those costs.”

Guerin also wanted to know about a RedC poll that the council had agreed to carry out in relation to its redevelopment of Ballisk House, the former credit union in Donabate, which is due to be repurposed as the town’s library, he said.

Work on restoring Ballisk House commenced in late February, according to the council website, with work expected to be completed by the end of the year.

Guerin wanted confirmation that the results of the RedC poll would not change that, he said, and that any decision to amend the masterplan would need to be taken by the councillors in the chamber.

If the council is going to open up a debate around the future of Ballisk House, it should take notes from the judicial review in Malahide and how much time could be lost here, he said.

“I’d ask before you go back on site at the sports hub, that you just make sure we’re not walking into another lion’s den,” he said.

RedC is being hired by the council to see if residents in the area actually want Ballisk House to be used as a library, Farrelly said. “There’s an understanding locally that that’s not the desired use of that building.”

Through this poll, the council wants to get an understanding of what locals want to see in there, be it a library, or for some other purpose, she said.

The plan that the council is working towards here is the Donabate framework plan, as well as its capital programme, she said.

If the poll comes back saying that locals aren’t in favour of moving the library, then the council will need to ask councillors whether they are willing to change course.

“Any change to the projects listed in either or both of those plans will have to come back to council,” she said.

CORRECTION: This article was updated at 14.35 on 16 April 2025 to reflect that DP Crossroads withdrew their judicial review. We apologise for the error.