Planning strategy 'flexible enough for rapid growth'
Environment Minister Dick Roche today rejected calls to draw up a new blueprint for regional development as the country’s population is expected to pass five million by 2020.
Insisting the National Spatial Strategy was the right way to go, Mr Roche said the scheme, drawn up in 2002, would be flexible enough to cope with the rapid growth.
The minister told delegates at the Irish Planning Institute conference in Sligo it would be premature to abandon it.
Mr Roche said: “I am satisfied that the NSS provides a strategic planning framework which is of sufficient robustness and flexibility to cater for our rapidly growing population, which is expected to grow to around five million by 2020. The NSS when published recognised this possibility.”
It has been predicted that Ireland’s population could reach pre-famine levels of eight million over the next 14 years.
Henk van der Kamp, president of the IPI, claimed yesterday that a more radical approach to development was needed, with a focus on spreading it across the country instead of just the eastern region.
He said it had been wrong to use Dublin as the focal point of roads, industry and life in Ireland.
Mr Roche also published the new draft development plan guidelines. The proposals aim to make the planning service more efficient while getting the right development in the right place.
And the minister said the Strategic Infrastructure Bill, which will be debated in Seanad Eireann next week, will ensure the planning system can cope with the challenge of rapid growth from a dynamic economy.
“My goal is to produce a planning system that is more responsive, emphasises good administration, good customer service and good communication. I want to make sure that it is democratic, and I want to tackle the log-jams that prevent the development that we all need,” he said.
Mr van der Kamp welcomed the publication of the draft guidelines.
“The need for best practice is all the more necessary as Ireland seeks to deal with the unprecedented development pressures that its economic success has generated,” he said.
And Mr van der Kamp said the IPI will be consulting all of its 600 members about the guidelines over the next few weeks.
