Revamped Clontarf seawater baths to open in six weeks

A €2 million refurbishment project at the Clontarf Seawater Baths, including a cafe bar and restaurant, is due to open in about six weeks, the Circuit Licensing Court in Dublin has heard.

Mr Justice Raymond Groarke, president of the Circuit Court, granted Clontarf Baths and Assembly Rooms Company a declaratory order that means when the development is completed in accordance with planning permission, it will automatically receive a seven-day drinks licence.

Barrister Dorothy Collins told the court the enterprise was almost complete and would open by mid-September at the latest. The redevelopment of the baths would provide a fully modernised open-air swimming pool for members of the public.

David Cullen, codirector with his mother, Mary Cullen, of the company that has owned the baths for more than a quarter of a century, told the court the new development would serve Dublin and parts of Co Wicklow on account of the Dart line running very close to it.

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He told Judge Groarke the seawater baths were in a unique position within Dublin City Council’s linear park consisting of the grassy acres and walkways sited between the Clontarf-Howth road and the Irish Sea.

Heated water

Mr Cullen said his company’s development had completely reconstructed and refurbished existing seawater baths that had existed on the site since the 1890s, and, like the old baths, they would use water from Dublin Bay.

The very large pool contained a sluice that would allow filtered and clean seawater to enter it and be pumped out again in a refreshment process. The water would be kept highly filtered and clean.

Swimming in the open-air pool would be at natural environmental temperatures but there would be a water-heating facility. The company had not yet decided on what basis, or when, the water would be warmed up.

He said work on the project had started last September following only one objection by a local resident. Full permission had been granted on appeal to An Bord Pleanála.

Ms Collins, who appeared for the company with Wallis Solicitors, told Judge Groarke that a drinks license attached to an existing premises had to be extinguished in order for it to be transferred to the Clontarf company.

A director of Browns Bar on the Naas Road, Co Dublin told the court the establishment had ceased to operate as a licensed premises and was to be redeveloped as a bicycle sales outlet.

Judge Groarke granted the declaratory order pending completion of works in line with planning permission.