CORK County Council's decision to grant permission for the first four houses of a proposed holiday village in a historic woodland in Glengarriff has been successfully appealed to An Bord Pleanala by the west Cork branch of An Taisce.
The native oak woodland, protected by successive Cork county development plans since the 1960s, was partially rezoned for holiday homes by councillors last year to facilitate the proposed development by Glengarriff Demesne Ltd.
The woodland, which forms the backdrop to the Eccles Hotel, has remained "more or less unchanged" over the years and was part of the overall amenity of Glengarriff, according to Mr Michael Walsh, the planning inspector who dealt with the appeal.
He said the holiday homes would have a "significant" impact, with parts of, some houses appearing as "intrusive elements". There was also a "basic and inherent conflict" between its protection and the holiday home zoning.
This zoning was not subject to review by An Bord Pleanala but the inspector noted in his report that the board was not bound by lit, particularly as much of the area behind the Eccles Hotel was zoned for woodland protection.
Although Mr Walsh was dubious about An Taisce's claim that the woodland was "environmentally critical stock", he said the proposed development would have a "severe impact on the woodland", outweighing any benefits from tree planting.
He also believed, and the appeals board agreed, that, there were discrepancies in locating two of the houses outside the boundaries of the site and that the "entire development extends well outside the limited zoned area" for holiday homes.
It would, therefore, not "be in order to grant the application on the information supplied" by Glengarriff Demesne Ltd.
Mr Tony Lowes, of the west Cork branch of An Taisce, said he was "pleased and surprised" by the outcome of the appeal, the eighth it had won in the past 18 months.
He said the Glengarriff case highlighted the need to have some consistency between the policy outlined in a county development plan and the land zonings adopted by councillors. "In this case, the policy was to protect the woodland, whereas the zoning was for holiday homes."
The developers were planning to build 19 holiday homes behind the Eccles Hotel. They applied for an initial nine, referring to a submission they had made on the county plan as their justification.
