Hi all,
A few of us attended a meeting arranged at short notice at the Customs House on Monday night. Trish (Cork Harbour tours contacted us). Shandon Boat club, Lee Rowing Club, Cork Dragons, MM and NC were represented at meeting.
The meeting was about proposed amendments to the Development Control Plan 2022-2028. The thrust of the matter is that these amendments have the potential to gravely affect our activities on the river and threaten the heritage of the river-clubs by way of the proposed positioning of three bridges in the vicinity of Shandon Boat Club. These amendments would appear to have been implemented without public consultation. The club will send a letter, on behalf of the club committee and membership, to the City Council before 5pm tonight (deadline for initial submissions). In it we assert our acknowledgement of the importance of development within the city but strongly state our objections to the threat to all sport/leisure activities in general on the river not being considered fully at this stage.
The inclusion of three bridges, especially the new LUAS bridge, is highlighted as a significant concern due to their low head heights, which pose a threat to leisure activities and increase flooding risks.
The talk is of a very 'flat' bridge for the LUAS, with much deeper structure than most on river, and potential implications not only on flooding risk, but on risk for boating and far more limited access to up river.
The council portal for objections can be accessed through this link: https://consult.corkcity.ie/en/consultation/proposed-variation-no-2-cork-city-development-plan-2022-2028
People of any age may make a submission and as per the Council's own guidelines: 'Submissions/ observations should include your name and address and where relevant, details of any organisation, community group or company etc. which you represent. Children or groups or associations representing the interests of children, are particularly encouraged to make submissions or observations'. So, feel free to mention your boat-club and make as many submissions from your household as there is motivation for! The portal requires that you use an existing account or register for account. Many of you will probably already have one through interacting with the council but if you feel this might be a barrier then a submission may also be made by email ( citydevplan@corkcity.ie )
Variation No. 2 Submissions, Strategic Planning and Heritage, Planning and Integrated Development Directorate, Cork City Council, City Hall, Anglesea Street, Cork, T12 T997
However, please note that in order to be valid, submissions must contain your name and address.
What we would suggest is that this needs further discussion and study first!
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In short, this variation shows a clear direction from the council to drive the rowing clubs, and all leisure activity East of the Eastern Gateway Bridge, making training, leisure use and competitions upriver far less feasible for the five city-based clubs.
The clubs currently co-exist with both commercial and leisure traffic on the river and recognise the vitality and commercial benefit that the access of large ships bring to the city centre, including the possibility of ferries and tourists. These proposals will serve to bring this to an end, in direct contrast to the policy of the council to activate connection to the water activities in the city.
- We would urge that a 'River Use feasibility Study' needs to be undertaken before decisions are made regarding this Variation to the Development Plan.
- We would like to see more detail, and consideration of the impact of removing ships altogether from the City Centre.
The more submissions, the more likely there might be some consideration given to implications before a blanket approval is given. The fact that a LUAS public consultation package does not even show any visualisations /images of any bridges shows a lot.
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No.1: Varition 2 - Development plan: Make a brief submission to above re- Variation NO.2: - Basically, flesh out a bit...."we have not been consulted and are very concerned about potential impacts"... not too much more needed. https://consult.corkcity.ie/en/consultation/proposed-variation-no-2-cork-city-development-plan-2022-2028
No.2: LUAS CORK - Deadline is 9th June!!.
This is the biggest impact bridge, and same concerns as above:
https://www.luascork.ie/en/#eprconsultation
Have Your Say
Register on the TII consultation portal and
Please note that in the interests of transparency, TII reserve the right to publish all submissions.
Once consultation on the Emerging Preferred Route closes, we will review and take into consideration the comments we receive.
The deadline for submissions is Monday 9th June at 5.30pm
Just scrambled my submission and submitted now, to get foot in the door and at least signal need for more consultation:
If anyone is interested in engaging feel free to grab
any bits.. Main message just needs to be the need for 'RIVER USE Feasibility Study' and 'impact assessment' ..on water users ( and City Harbour)
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The proposed variation 2 shows a clear direction from the council to drive the rowing clubs, and all leisure activity East of the Eastern Gateway Bridge, making training, leisure use and competitions upriver far less feasible for the five city-based clubs, and other water users.
The clubs currently co-exist with both commercial and leisure traffic on the river and recognise the vitality and commercial benefit that the access of large ships bring to the city centre, including the possibility of ferries and tourists. These proposals will serve to bring this to an end, in direct contrast to the policy of the council to activate connection to the water activities in the city.
- We would urge that a 'River Use feasibility Study' needs to be undertaken and river users consulted before decisions are made regarding this Variation to the Development Plan.
- We would like to see more detail, and consideration of the impact of removing ships altogether from the City Centre. The proposal for the LUAS bridge is a 'Flat' bridge of significant depth for structural reasons and likely to to create significant restriction to boating access and massive impact to the Maritime Heritage of the city centre. We are not convinced that the alternative routes for this Luas line have been considered fully, before a development plan variation effectively allows the new bridge.
While we very much support the concept of introducing a Luas in Cork, connecting east and west through the city centre. However, we have very significant concerns about the proposal to cross the river, to run down McCurtain Street, and then cross the river over a new bridge, downriver of the Customs House site, just to link to Kent rail station.
It seems and extraordinarily costly addition to this route, to have to create a new bridge rather than travel down the Quays and connect into the Docklands from the city centre.
The sad thing is that the European Maritime Day held in Cork last weekend maybe the last of its kind ever in the city centre if this proceeds. The Vista of visiting ships and sailing boats in the city will be a thing of the past.
The limitations this will create on marine related activity on the river cannot be underestimated.
I am involved in Dragon Boating right through the year, providing support to, and helming for the Cork Dragons., a breast cancer survivors group. This group keeps their boats opposite the Clayton hotel most of the time on the pontoon on the boardwalk. Whenever the tide is high these boats are moved down below the river and tied up on the pontoon at the former Port Of Cork site. If this site was no longer accessible outside of high water, the boats could not be maintained in Cork city. The only opportunity to allow the sporting activity would be to move it to another part of Cork harbour removing all of this activity from the city centre for good.
I am a committee member of the Currach club in Cork, Naomhoga Chorcai, who regularly row from our site by Shandon boat club, up the river when the tide allows access on either the north or south channel. As we understand the proposal for a real bridge will involve a significantly deeper structure, which will be significantly lower than the other bridges, as we understand, restricting access even further. Without this access up river rowing becomes impossible for us if the weather conditions downriver do not allow water access.
I have been involved for many years in the Cork harbour festival, and in other water related activities on the water in both a leisure and a professional capacity, and in my role as a Grade 1 Conservation Architect, work closely with local authorities mainly in the Munster region. The devastating impact of removing marine activity from the city centre ‘harbour’ can definitely not be underestimated.
It seems as though the alternative routes which would not require the New rail bridge have been mainly ruled out on the basis that there would not be a connection to Kent Station without this route. It would seem an enormous price to pay, to avoid a five minute walk and the impact of adding this section of the route will be irreversible. While the benefits of connecting to the train station are obvious, the impact on the harbour, the river and Port Of Cork will be devastating from a maritime point of view. This would also allow direct connection to the City bus network and City Bus terminal.
We would urge that City Council carry out more consultation and review options before putting variation in place that would give LUAS team a clear path to bridge proposal without consideration of river implications or inclusion of proper discussion and review of alternatives. It is significant that the Luas proposals give no 3-D visualisations of the proposed bridges on the rivers, while they have plenty of seductive images of all of the street tram views!
We are not convinced the implications have been fully considered, and need more consultation.
Good work Oisín, the more submissions the better, scattergun approach!
Done!
Done, so far 67 submissions. Hopefully there'll be more before 5. Now start lobbying councillors to get them to at least postpone till studies have been carried out.
Hi, I've emailed in, the link didn't work. If this is as serious as it looks, should we mobilise the whole club via all communication channels?
I lodged my submission.
Funnily enough it is still noting 67 received submissions 🤔
Hmmmmm
