Activist delayed stricken area’s f lood defence
AN environmentalist and planning activist lodged an objection to the construction of defences in the flood-hit lower Shannon, setting the project back at least 15 months.
Families in Springfield, Clonlara, Co. Clare, have been evacuated from their homes after heavy rain caused the Shannon to burst its banks.
Seven thousand sandbags were delivered to the area to help protect homes, but several houses have now been cut off by floods.
Peter Sweetman, of Lower Rathmines Road, Dublin 6, first objected on September 9, 2018, to Clare County Council’s €1.2million flood defence plan for the area.
The project’s aim was to stop winter flooding from the Shannon at Clonlara. The area is currently suffering severe flooding and some residents have been evacuated.
Mr Sweetman, a son of the late former Fine Gael finance minister Hugh Gerard Sweetman, has a history of objecting to developments across the country.
He has been at the forefront of campaigns opposing Shell Corrib gas pipeline plans, wind farm grid connections, a €3.6billion Intel facility in Kildare and the construction of a sea wall at US president Donald Trump’s golf club at Doonbeg, Co. Clare.
The proposed Flood Mitigation Scheme for Springfield, Clonlara, included a pumping station and earthen flood protection embankment, provision of two sluices and culverts, as well as the widening and alteration to the existing surface water drainage network.
It was withdrawn by the council on November 1, 2018.
The flooding in the area is now threatening ten local houses.
According to the planning application file, Mr Sweetman was the sole objector to the plans. Bridget Kinsella, a widowed mother-of-three whose home is surrounded by the floodwater, said: ‘How [the council] could take his opinion on board, and how they could take advice from one person, and stop all this, I’m sorry, I really don’t understand it.’
Seán Lenihan, senior engineer with Clare County Council, said he expected the council would re-submit its proposals for planning permission in the next three weeks.
In email correspondence with this reporter, Mr Sweetman said he objected to the plans, claiming ‘the permission did not comply with the habitats directive.’