Council chief is urged to revise zoning 'oversight'

A Westport councillor has pleaded with the chief executive of Mayo County Council to revise the zoning for a piece of land at Westport Quay from agricultural to housing.

Cllr John O’Malley said land beside a development of five houses in The Quay area (on the Ardmore Road) had been incorrectly zoned for agricultural use, even though local councillors had submitted a map showing it was fully serviced by public utilities and that the contractor wished to develop five additional smaller houses at the site.

“There’s footpaths, sewerage and water all laid on in this estate already and there could be five more houses built there easily. These would be smaller than those that were already built there by somebody else and finished by the contractor that bought them, who is now proposing to build five additional smaller houses there.” 

Cllr Peter Flynn seconded the proposal, asking whether the amendment could be included in the proposed variation to the Mayo County Development Plan, which is due to come before the public shortly, thus reducing the need for further delays in building the additional houses.

Chief executive Kevin Kelly explained that the public consultation on the variation is part of a statutory process that cannot be interfered with, but it could be revisited once the public display period had passed.

Cllr Flynn added: “Anyone who has visited the site in question can see it was definitely an oversight not to have included this in the variation and maybe we should have been more alert as councillors. But it has come to our attention now that there was an omission, and if it is not statutorily possible to include this in the variation report due out in December, I would hope we can amend it in the next round of negotiations on the variation, just to save time.” 

Cllr O’Malley pointed out that the additional houses would be in great demand.

Cllr Chris Maxwell supported the submission, declaring: “We are in the middle of a housing crisis. Here we have a developer who wants to build houses. It should be a no-brainer.” 

Mr Kelly pointed out that to change the zoning now would be a material change to the variation and would undermine the whole process. However, he confirmed that once the public display process ended, he expected a wide range of issues to be raised in relation to the zoning proposals in the variation, and that the Quay matter could also be raised then.

• Published as part of the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme.