“If they are shocked at our appeal they must not have been reading the papers for the last 20 years.”
That’s what Waterford Social Democrats Councillor Mary Roche told The Munster Express in relation to the disappointment and confusion expressed by South Kilkenny Councillors last week.
This comes after Waterford City and County Council appealed planning permission that had been granted by Kilkenny County Council, which would have allowed Dunnes Stores to open in Ferrybank shopping centre as an anchor store. This appeal was deemed invalid, and now Waterford City Council have leave to pursue a judicial review of the planning process.
Although she clarified that she personally had made no objections and that this was a decision of the Waterford Council as an entity, Cllr. Mary Roche had strong words against the purposed development in Ferrybank shopping centre.
“The shopping centre should never have been built. In its current scale and style it is a monument to the worst excesses of the Celtic Tiger. We objected to it being built in the very beginning. Objections like this from one council to another are very rare, and it would not have been done lightly,” Cllr. Roche told this newspaper.
“I think it’s bad faith from them pushing a development of this size and scale on the edge of Waterford City. They would not permit this to happen in Kilkenny City. Waterford City is a retail centre for the entire South East, and retail everywhere is already under severe pressure from online shopping and everything else,” she said.
Cllr. Roche went on to say that Dunnes Stores was a great business, but that Ferrybank is a suburb of Waterford City and as such the development should become a neighbourhood centre or something more appropriate. She concluded by saying it remains to be seen if Kilkenny County Council followed their own rules in relation to the recent planning application.
“Under their own rules if something of this scale is to be developed then there has to be a retail impact assessment. If that’s done and it comes back ok then our hands may be tied. But their own senior planner recommended a retail impact assessment,” she said.
“The courts will decide but this judicial review was not sought frivolously,” Cllr. Roche added.
AARON KENT Funded by the Local Democracy Reporting scheme
