Hearing on golf course site swap begins today

An oral hearing of an appeal against a proposal to establish an 18-hole golf course on Bray Head gets under way in the Royal Hotel, Bray, this morning.

Under the terms of an agreement between a local property developer and Bray Golf Club, the club would move from its present 50-acre town-centre site in Bray to a larger site on the head.

Bray Urban District Council took the unusual step of hiring consultants to prepare a plan for the development of the existing club.

It said this was because of the importance of the location as the last remaining greenfield site within the town boundaries.

The plan envisages a mixed commercial, residential and leisure development, with access by means of a new road from Ravenswell on the Dublin Road.

However, the proposal to develop the land on the head for a golf course and club house has run into opposition from local people, members of the Save Our Head Organisation (SOHO), who have started a campaign for a Special Amenity Area Order (SAAO) to be placed on it.

The SAAO would effectively prohibit all development on the head.

The issue provoked a major dispute among members of Wicklow County Council recently after a local organisation, Wicklow Environmental Solutions Trust (WEST), produced a leaflet suggesting that councillors who were members of the Vocational Education Committee had an interest in the proposal, because the VEC was to get facilities in Bray under the deal.

The leaflet was also critical of Mr Blaise Treacy, the Wicklow county manager at the time of the grant of planning permission, for also being a member of Bray Golf Club.

However, Mr Treacy responded that he had declared his interest at the appropriate time and had left the meeting when the matter was being discussed.

The independent TD for Wicklow, Ms Mildred Fox, said the council had voted 23 to one in favour of the planning permission at the time and the leaflet was an attack on the democratic process.

However, Ms Deirdre de Burca, a Green Party representative on Wicklow County Council and a member of WEST, said: "The public have a right to know who has an interest in planning decisions."

The appeal hearing is expected to last two days.