Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council has approved plans to rezone the grounds of Dún Laoghaire Golf Club (GC), paving the way for its relocation to a new home in Co Wicklow.
At a 12-hour meeting of the local authority, which concluded at 4 a.m. yesterday, councillors agreed to rezone the controversial golf club site as part of its County Development Plan 2004-2010.
The absence of a number of councillors in the chamber proved vital in swinging the vote in favour of the rezoning, which had been previously rejected by the council.
Eight Fianna Fáil and four Fine Gael councillors backed the motion to rezone 23 hectares of land at the site for residential use, 7.5 hectares for open space, 1.8 hectares for business and 0.2 hectares for a neighbourhood centre.
Eleven councillors voted against and one, Mr Tony Kelly (FF), abstained.
Three councillors who voted against the rezoning last November, Ms Betty Coffey (FF), Ms Louise Cosgrave (FG) and Ms Helen Keogh (FG), were not in attendance.
The Minister for the Environment, Mr Cullen, had told the councillors to rezone 40 hectares of land at Tuesday night's meeting or their development plan would be deemed invalid, and the county manager would impose a plan on their behalf.
In a view endorsed by legal advisors to the council, the Minister claimed the zoning shortfall had to be made up for the plan to comply with the council's housing strategy.
The golf club lands have been earmarked for 1,700 homes, to be built by Cosgrave Developments.
In June 2002, the club's members agreed overwhelmingly to sell its grounds to the company in return for a new 27-hole golf course and a new clubhouse with ancillary facilities at Ballyman Road, between Enniskerry and Bray, as well as €20 million in cash.
In a separate development at the meeting, the council voted unanimously to change the status of certain lands at the Airfield estate in Dundrum from residential to open space. The move was aimed at blocking a planned housing development at the site of the urban farm.
Two other parcels of land at Sandyford and Kilternan were rezoned for residential use at the meeting, leaving a shortfall of just 7 hectares by 4 a.m.
The county manager, Mr Derek Brady, said he was happy to leave it up to his planning department to identify remaining lands for rezoning, thereby allowing the development plan to be approved by the council.
The Dún Laoghaire Business Association yesterday welcomed the decision to rezone the golf course. Its honorary secretary, Mr Breasal Ó Caollaí, said claims by Cllr Kealin Ireland (Greens) that the rezoning had no local support were untrue.
Ms Ireland had described the FF/FG voting pact as "nothing sort of shameful".
