Draft guidelines on planning in midwest

THE AMOUNT of large-scale retail development built or submitted for the midwest meets all requirements for the next 13 years. That is one of the findings contained in the midwest draft regional planning guidelines 2010-2022, to be presented today to members of the Midwest Regional Authority in Limerick.

However, the draft plan says that “further inappropriate retail development will inevitably have detrimental impacts on some existing established retail areas and that these impacts may be irreversible”.

Providing a preview of what will be contained in the region’s forthcoming retail strategy, the draft guidelines state that “other centres would also be likely to suffer significant damage over time giving rise to vacancy, decay and ultimately dereliction”.

On land zoned for development in the area, the draft guidelines say: “More than 2,500 hectares of land is zoned for residential development, capable of accommodating over 100,000 homes or nearly double the anticipated demand, not taking into account development that may take place in smaller settlements with no zoned land and in the countryside.”

On its recommendations, the guidelines say that zoned land should be assigned to different phases of development with a proviso that, generally, later phases should not get under way until a given percentage of an earlier phase has been granted planning permission.

The draft adds that economic challenges facing the region are significant.

“In particular, the region is exposed in that significant amounts of its economic activity are in sectors that are currently under severe pressure – agriculture, tourism, the construction sector and the export manufacturing sector.”

The draft guidelines also say that future work to develop the western rail corridor “should continue and provision should be made for stations or halts at all settlements along the line at Crusheen in Co Clare.

Consideration should also be given to the provision of a halt at the Ennis Information Age Park.”