Fingal County Council has declared a planning application by the National Transport Authority for a ‘strategic’ park-and-ride facility near M1 as ‘invalid’.
The 733 space car park in Lissenhall, just north of Swords, was to encourage commuters to leave their vehicles and take buses into the city and forms part of the NTA’s wide park-and-ride strategy for the Greater Dublin Area.
The council rejected the application, invalidating it as the site notice, application form and newspaper notice descriptions did not match. The application was also deemed not to include details of a planned on-site wastewater treatment system.
In the decision letter, Fingal County Council also said a series of proposed developments were judged to be drawn to an incorrect scale, had incorrect elevations or had photos which “do not appear to be reflective of the drawing plans and elevations”.
The developments the council took issue with include a proposed bus shelter, bike lockers, a bike shelter, toilets and an ESB substation.
A spokesman for the NTA said the reasons for the rejection “are all minor such as inconsistency in the wording of the site notice and newspaper advertisement and some issues with the scaling of drawings submitted”.
The spokesman said the NTA is addressing the issues and will resubmit the application “in a matter of days”.
In the application, the NTA sought permission to build 733 car parking spaces, which would be made up of 522 standard spaces, 37 spaces for mobility-impaired users, 72 spaces designated for electric vehicles and an additional 72 space futureproofed for electric vehicles.
Based on a 6.74 hectare site located at Lissenhall Little, just west of the junction 4 of the M1 motorway into Dublin, the facility would include 3 bus bays as well as passenger shelters in a bid to “enhance accessibility and convenience for users”. To enable active travel, the development would include bike shelter and lockers.
The proposed Lissenhall park-and-ride development was expected to serve as a short-term interim solution which would eventually be replaced by a considerably larger, 3,500 vehicle car park nearby to service the planned Dublin metro system once constructed.
Revealing the plans in response to a parliamentary question in February, the NTA said the development is planned as an “interim solution to reduce vehicles entering the city before the commencement of operation of the Metrolink”.
It said the project would “intercept car trips where people are reliant on private cars at an early viable point in their journeys thereby reducing the distances travelled by private car with a corresponding reduction in carbon emissions congestion.”
