Plans for smaller Burren visitors' facility lodged on behalf of Minister

PLANS have been lodged with Clare County Council on behalf of the Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, Mr Higgins, seeking permission for a scaled down visitor facility near Mullaghmore, in the Burren.

But opponents of the original plan for a much larger building on the site insist they will fight the new proposal right through the planning process on the same grounds: they believe it is the wrong location for such a development.

Described officially as an "entry point" for the proposed Burren National Park, the latest scheme comprises a covered waiting area, toilets, park ranger offices, a storeroom, car parking and signage.

It involves the removal, retention or completion of various elements of the intensely controversial "interpretative centre" which the Office of Public Works was planning for the Mullaghmore site.

This scheme had to be abandoned when the Burren Action Group, which led a five year campaign against the proposed centre, won an action in the Supreme Court against the OPW's exemption from planning control.

The current application, lodged by the OPW on behalf of Mr Higgins, provides for the construction of a reservoir and sewage treatment plant at the Mullaghmore site, as well as the proposed visitor facility.

To minimise its visual impact, this facility would be faced in stone and set into the contours of the land, with its roof covered by earth. There would he a canopy at the front to provide shelter for visitors.

The site of the much larger interpretative centre - now abandoned "wilt otherwise be backfilled and the land reinstated to its previous condition", according to an explanatory leaflet issued by the Minister.

It says the plan is in line with the Burren National Park Study, published earlier this year, which proposed there should be a "limited level of visitor facilities within the national park", at Mullaghmore.

The study proposed the provision of interpretation facilities in Corofin, Kilfenora and Ballyvaughan, on the Burren periphery, to protect its core from the pressures of mass tourism.

Prof Emer Colleran, of An Taisce, said the proposed visitor facility at Mullaghmore would provide a focus for visitor pressure. setting a "dangerous precedent" for other tourist related developments in the area.

She said that although it was smaller than the original scheme, they would have the same objection, on the same grounds as they had all along.

"Any visitor centre should be located in a gateway village, as happens in every national park throughout the world," she said.

"Basically, it would appear that the Government cannot admit that it made a mistake in rushing ahead to build what is currently on site and feels it must build something there. But two wrongs don't make a right."