Firm loses court challenge over Cliffs of Moher car park
A private firm has lost a High Court challenge to try and close down a car park operated at the Cliffs of Moher by Clare County Council.
A dispute arose over whether a condition of the planning permission required a temporary car park to be removed after completion of the visitor centre’s construction to allow for a park-and-ride initiative.
Diamrem, which has built park-and-ride facilities at Doolin and Liscannor to facilitate access to the attraction, claimed the car park is an unauthorised development and the Cliffs of Moher Centre has failed to comply with conditions attached to the planning permission granted for the visitor centre.
Clare County Council receives about €7m in revenue per annum from visitors using the 481-space car park. A total of 1,527,000 people visited the cliffs last year, up 7% on 2016.
The council claimed An Bord Pleanála granted planning permission for a permanent car park at the cliffs without it ever being conditional on anything to do with park-and-ride facilities.
In an affidavit, council director of services Ger Dollard said it never envisaged abandoning the proposal for a permanent car park at the Cliffs of Moher but the original one proposed was never built. He said the council believed a separate planning process in 2004 permitted the continued use of the car park beyond the period of construction of the visitor centre and its duration was not limited to works on the facility.
Mr Dollard accused Diamrem of “attempting to establish a monopoly operation at considerable inconvenience to the public and contrary to the development envisaged by An Bord Pleanála”.
Diamrem claimed An Bord Pleanála never granted planning permission for a permanent car park at the cliffs.
The company argued an application by the council in 2017 to carry out works at the site was designed to continue to operate the facility as a permanent car park.
John Flanagan, a director of Diamrem, said it would render the company’s park-and-ride facility inoperable “as nobody will use a park-and-ride facility if they can drive directly to the visitor centre and park in the car park”.
In her ruling, Ms Justice Mary Faherty said she found no basis for Diamrem’s contention that An Bord Pleanála did not grant planning permission for a permanent car park at the Cliffs of Moher.
She said it was clear the condition imposed by An Bord Pleanála about a “mobility management strategy” for the visitor centre was “a fluid process” or “a work in progress”.
Ms Justice Faherty noted that Diamrem had not challenged modifications made to the temporary car park in 2004 by the council which had been the subject of a full public consultation.
In any case, she also ruled that the time for Diamrem to initiate enforcement proceedings had expired and was now statute barred.
