This is the view that confronts pedestrians walking from Hyde Terrace in Mohill when they want to go into town.

The footpath has been closed off to allow from the development of a block of apartments, and has been closed for several months. There are no parking restrictions on either side of the street, and mothers with buggies have to cross the street to pass, if they can find a gap in the parked cars on the other side of the street. There are no traffic lights on this street and no pedestrian crossings.

This is what happens when your Local Authority and elected Councillors promote the view that towns are for parking cars and developing property and not places where people live and bring up children.

This development should not have been allowed go ahead until:

Local residents had been consulted about its potential impact

The Developer had provided a secure walkway past the site

The Developer had provided for temporary speed ramps on the road

The Local Authority had imposed (and enforced) parking restrictions on the other side of the road

Given the the footpath was obviously going to be closed for several months, is that really that much to ask?

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I live about a mile from Leitrim Village and about 3 miles from Cootehall, 2 villages in the Upper Shannon Basin that know all about the effects of the Section 23 Rural Renewal Scheme.

Leitrim Village has quadrupled in size in the last 5 years, and there are now more holiday homes and apartments in the village than houses where people actually live. The centre of the village was also dug up to build an hotel, which was haled at the time as an economic miracle. The hotel, which still isn’t finished, is now up for sale.

Cootehall is another village on the Shannon, but is in Roscommon rather than Leitrim. Its famous for a couple of reasons. Firstly, its the home place of recently deceased and former FF Minister Sean “Doc” Doherty. Secondly, its where John McGahern grew up, which he describes in his book, “Memoir”.

When I first came to this area, I thought Cootehall was a perfect village. It was built around 3 sides of triangular green, unlike so many other villages that are built along the sides of national and regional roads. Every house on the green faced every other house on the green, which I though created a real sense of place and community.

This didn’t sit too well with Roscommon County Council, however, so they decided to granted planning permission for 40 holiday homes and helicopter pad on the green. Cootehall now looks like this:

Apparently, tearing the heart out of villages like this promotes economic development. I just wish someone would explain how.

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Leitrim County Council recently devoted an entire Council session to the issue of planning.

The debate that took place is interesting in that it yet again demonstrates that the elected members of Leitrim County Council don’t understand the basic principles of proper planning.

They appear to be stuck in some sort of pre-1964 Twilight Zone* in which issues like rural transport, waste management, water quality, road saftey, education, economic development and protection of the environment are a load of old nonsense made up by people in Dublin to keep themselves busy and have no meaning anywhere west of the M50.

Some of the utterances of the Councillors are worth repeating here (in some cases paraphrased) . I’ve added my own comments too. I haven’t noted the Party membership of the Councillors, given that there isn’t any distinction between them.

Cllr. Tony Ferguson (Manorhamilton):

“If we get a house built in Leitrim, its 5 jobs.”

Cllr. Ferguson would appear to be suggesting that we just keep building housing to keep people in jobs. I’m not sure how many houses Cllr. Ferguson thinks this would involve, or what we should do when there aren’t any more houses left to build. Perhaps we could knock them down and re-build them?

Cllr. Sean McGowan (Carrick on Shannon):

“I would ask the Council to look favourably on any planning application along the N4.”

Hopefully, at some future Council session, Cllr. McGowan can suggest a ways in which the N4 can be widened, if, as he hopes, it is lined with housing development.

Cllr. Michael Colreavy (Manorhamilton):

“I propose a reduction in site line requirements along the various roads in the County”.

Its hard to understand how an elected representative could publically call for a change in planning policy that would make our roads more dangerous.

Cllr. Enda McGloin (Dromahair):

“The 7 year Occupancy Clause needs to be removed from grants of planning permission.”

Where a grant of planning permission is made is an area which is experiencing development pressure, the Council will sometimes require the applicant to live in the house for 7 years. This is to ensure that valuable sites are used by people who want to live in the area and not by speculators.

The clause is very rarely used by Leitrim County Council, and where it is, it is never enforced. This had led to a situation in which up to 15% of houses for sale in Leitrim today are new builds that nobody has ever lived in.

I can’t understand why the Councillors want this removed. Given that suitable sites are becoming increasingly scarce in Leitrim, I would have thought that the Council should be doing everything it can to preserve these sites for people who want to live in Leitrim.
This might not be in the interests of speculators, builders and estate agents, but somehow I don’t think they’ll starve.

*Planning first became a legal concept in 1964

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