An Taisce appeal 'overplays' significance of Tinerana House

AN TAISCE has been accused of “scaremongering” in opposing plans for a €100 million tourism development at Tinerana House in east Clare.

Earlier this year, Clare County Council gave the go-ahead for the large investment in east Clare.

The plan lodged includes the refurbishment of Tinerana House, an 18-hole golf course, a 32-bed hotel, 116 two-bed holiday homes and an equestrian centre.

Tinerana Ltd said that the development would generate €13 million a year for the local economy.

Former doctor Paschal Carmody and his wife Dr Freida Keane Carmody sold Tinerana House on 270 acres of land on the shores of Lough Derg to Limerick developers Joe Hanrahan and John Shee in 2006.

An Taisce has thrown the proposal into doubt by lodging an appeal with An Bord Pleanála.

In response to the An Taisce appeal, consultants for the developers said: “The architectural and cultural significance is significantly overplayed by An Taisce and the suggestion that such a proposal would ruin the legacy of . . . Irish country houses is disingenuous and without substance or foundation.

“An Taisce are attempting to vigorously oppose this development on broad sweeping generalisations including infrastructural, economic and private investment grounds, irrespective or ignorant of conclusive findings presented in the planning application.”

The details of the appeal, they said, “are at times factually incorrect, misleading, without foundation and/or . . . made without due consideration or review of all the information enclosed with the planning application.”

In a submission on behalf of the developers, architectural historian Judith Hill said that An Taisce’s account “is notably scaremongering”.

Ms Hill said An Taisce’s heritage officer Ian Lumley “exaggerates when he claims that the development of the last 15 years has resulted in the ‘irrevocable destruction of some of Ireland’s most significant country houses and their landscape settings’.”

She said it could be argued that “their future survival has been ensured by the developments”.

Ms Hill said there was no architect involved in the design of Tinerana and that it “only has a regional significance. Tinerana as a house in the context of Irish country houses, is notably insignificant”.

Ms Hill said that An Taisce had put forward “a romantic view that overplays the significance of Tinerana, fails to take into account that landscape and architecture change over time and assumes that the current state of Tinerana evokes some vaguely defined past state . . . Although the current application will involve considerable change, it will effectively preserve hugely significant facets of the demesne that might, with further neglect, be destroyed.”