Sir, - Marian Harkin (August 15th), put the question of the rural housing sprawl in perspective. Frank McDonald and others have a fixation about the number of single houses being built in rural areas, whereas our major spatial problems are the expansion of Dublin through counties Dublin, Meath, Kildare and Wicklow and the depopulation of the countryside.
More than 20 years ago I suggested to the then Taoiseach that national development would be more balanced if the political and administrative capital was transferred to, say, Athlone, leaving the financial and commercial capital in Dublin, a situation similar to that existing in Australia, Brazil, Turkey, Canada, US and Italy.
This suggestions was ignored and we are now in a situation where the growth of Dublin is out of control. In 20 years the population of the greater Dublin area will exceed 2 million and many rural areas will be depopulated and derelict.
The continued growth of Dublin is destroying the quality of life in the city. Traffic congestion, pollution, alienation and crime will continue to grow and more and more people will spend more and more hours in traffic and living in the impersonal and artificial outer suburbs.
Radical action is needed to contain its growth and rebalance the development of our country. If a small fraction of the billions going into the Luas, the Liffey tunnel, the underground and the other projects designed to make life in Dublin tolerable was diverted to local authorities they could compulsorily acquire and develop sites in towns an villages throughout the country to revitalise rural communities.
Similarly, land could be acquired in city-centre areas for those who wish to live in city-centre apartments.
If laws, or indeed the Constitution have to be changed to make the possible this should be done in order to prevent the destruction of our capital and the desolation of our countryside.
We have the lowest population density in the EU south of the Arctic circle. We can afford to cater for different tastes. Although our tradition is rural the majority will probably wish to live in villages towns and cities.
A small percentage will wish to live in urban apartments. The State should facilitate people who wish to own their own houses by providing sufficient suitable sites at reasonable prices.
Those who wish to live outside towns and cities, and by the way, they are not philistines, should be encouraged to do so and many of them become active in their communities.
From an overall development viewpoint it is better that some thousands of small farmers, provincial architects and builders make relatively modest profits than that a small number of large farmers, speculators and developers make obscene profits in the suburbs of Dublin.
Those who have supported Frank McDonald's thesis reflect the urban attitudes of England and Germany where the population density is many times higher than ours and where there is very little unspoiled countryside.
In countries with plenty of space much as the US, Canada and Scandinavia, a significant number of people opt to live outside built-up areas, without urban amenities, where they can have some of the benefits of the countryside and have a better quality of life. These homes don't blight the countryside, they adorn it and embellsh it.
The Royal Town Planning Institute and other "experts" offer an English solution to an Irish problem. In our situation we should rationally establish our priorities and not allow our selves to be bullied by self-styled experts whose opinions are derived from countries with different problems and different priorities. - Yours, etc.,
Cathal MacGabhann, Na Fabhra∅ Maola Thoir, Bearna, Gaillimh.