Galway County Council have announced their intention to review the Local Area Plans (LAP) for Athenry, Oranmore & Loughrea. These LAP’s will provide the objectives and policies within which the future development of these towns will be assessed for at least the next six years. The LAP’s also include the zoning provisions for each of the towns. Each of the new LAPs must adhere to the Galway County Development Plan, 2009 – 2015, which has been recently varied to include a revised core strategy with generally reduced population projections than those that would have been in place when the previous LAP for these towns were adopted (2005).
The upcoming review of the Athenry, Loughrea and Oranmore LAPs, will therefore in all likelihood, result in either the “down-/dezoning” or the introduction of “phasing” of development land. These two strategies are commonly adopted by the Planning Authority in order to demonstrate compliance with reduced population projections. “Down-/dezoning” is the removal of one landuse and its replacement with another which would could be of less economic value to the landowner (i.e. changing residential zoned lands to “amenity” or “agricultural” etc.). “Phasing” refers to the mechanism whereby the existing zoning is retained, but the principle of the development of the phased land is contingent on either (a) other lands being developed first, or (b) delayed for an intangible period – i.e. development may not be considered within the lifespan of the new Local Area Plan (at least another 6 years), with no certainty even then that development could occur.
The imposition of down-zoning and/or phasing has a significant impact on land values and may also prejudice the extension of duration process should an extant permission be in place (i.e. an extension of permission application could be refused by the Planning Authority as there has been a change in the Development Plan policy). Therefore it is of vital importance that you are aware of and evaluate your portfolio of lands within the Local Area Plan Boundaries of Athenry, Loughrea and Oranmore, to assess whether it is necessary to make a submission to the Planning Authority at this stage. Written pre-draft submissions or observations have been invited by Galway County Council to be received no later than 4.00pm on Friday 1st July 2011.
A copy of the public notice and links to the relevant Plans is included below. The plans are currently in pre-draft stage and there will be a further opportunity to make submissions once a draft plan has been released.
http://www.galway.ie/en/News/Title,16118,en.html
At this stage we would recommend that you review the lands in which you have an interest within the relevant towns and consider whether to make a submission, should you have any queries in relation to any of these lands please forward a location map to us and we can advise on any planning issues that may be relevant and if necessary prepare any required submissions.