Unit 2 Finnstown Shopping Centre, Newcastle Rd, Lucan, Co Dublin
Fax 6211858
E mail finnstowninputgroup@hotmail.com

10 things you should know about Adamstown

1. Size; A town the size of Tralee in a space the size of Luttrelstown Golf course, close to an area already with severe traffic and flooding issues.
2. Number of Houses; could be up to 10,000 units that’s an average of 1,500 to built each year over a 7 year period. (Comments are now been made that there could be housing there by 2002.)
3. Construction; Conservative estimates would put the number at 2,500 construction workers on site, bringing additional traffic into this area. All trucks serving Adamstown would have to travel up and down the Newcastle Rd.Passing 3 schools each time where 1,500 children use to get to school.
4. Traffic; there will be 2 exits on the Newcastle and 1 on the Celbridge Rd with dual carriage planned to flyover the Newcastle Rd at the railway end to connect with the OOR (this is subject to an oral hearing taken place on June 26^th see LTQL)
5. Trains; Irish rail only have plans for 1 train station in the Greater Lucan which will be built in Adamstown. Train capacity will be 6,000 people per hr, which could be full before it reaches Adamstown. This station will not be ready for use until 2005 at the earliest, by which time there could be 3,000 housing units in Adamstown.
6. Buses; A bus corridor running North /South down through Dodsborough and onto the N4. It is unlikely this service would run in the early years of development.
7. Schools; Adamstown will have population of 21,250 when complete. Yet only one new primary and one secondary school are planned. Greater Lucan has a population of 29,500 and has 9 primary & 5 secondary schools. Last year 70 children who wished to attend St Thomas school were turned away, and the Community Collage had to execute a lottery for those seeking to attend.
8. Flood management; this area had severe problems last November. One third of all surface water is due to drain into the Griffeen. All surface water from Grange Castle will also drain into the Griffeen. This will mean a total of 450 additional acres will use the Griffeen.
9. Other Developments; A further 2,500 to build in the Greater Lucan area in the same time frame. Newcastle will see another 1,200 houses which a percentage will use the Newcastle Rd. Additional lanes in both directions on the N4 causing major Congestion. New interchange on the N4 at the Newcastle junction and at Woodie’s
10. Responsibility; SDCC say they are the governing. Some statements have been at variance with this. This is a new type of development High Rise, High Density it’s never been done before in this country.

Can we be sure SDCC can deliver on all aspects of this plan?

Brief members on issue raised in submissions 20^th June 2001

Managers report to be circulated to members 27^th June 2001

Briefing of members in Committee 28^th June 2001

Final date for submissions of motions 2^nd July 2001

Special Council Meeting 16^th July 2001

The Finnstown input group hold weekly meeting if you would like to attend pleases contact Tom on 086 2505665, or contact us at finnstowninputgroup@hotmail.com

LTQL,

As you are most likely aware, An Bord Pleanala have confirmed the following:

An Bord Pleanala, represented by Mr. Brendan Devlin, will hold "an oral hearing into the objections which have been received against confirmation of the order and also into the submissions received in relation to the likely effects on the environment of the proposed road development and to report to the Board thereon".

Date: 26^th. June, 2001.

Time: 11.00 am.

Place: Limerick Suite, Spa Hotel, Lucan, Co. Dublin.

This vindicates the position we took in March when we came together in The Foxhunter to consolidate our opposition to the Outer Ring Road proposal. Little did we imagine the work that was ahead of us.

However, through determination and sheer hard work on your part, and your colleagues, you established a wonderful ground support network,which delivered.

It is important that LTQL gives a "pre-oral hearing" report to all of the Residents Associations, explaining exactly what is planned for the 26^th. This will take place at a meeting in The Foxhunter on Monday, June 25^th. At 8.00pm.

At a local level, please promote the hearing by way of newsletters/web sites etc.

Let people know that we expect to see that room filled. Enclosed you will find an example leaflet which you are welcome to put your letterhead over and distribute.

Finally, we mention the costs of engaging Consultants and Legal Advisers to represent us at the oral hearing. These charges will be significant.

To help defray these costs we are organising a Grand Pub Quiz.

This will take place at The Penny Hill on Tuesday 3^rd. July at 8.30pm.

This project is being co-ordinated by Paul O'Farrell (paulofarrell@eircom.net or 086 2264593) & Noel Brant (087 2074337). If you can help give them a call.

This night must be a success in order to sustain the campaign against the ORR.

I look forward to meeting you in The Foxhunter on the 25^th.

• We are not against Adamstown, in principle.
• We know Dublin needs Housing, and a new style of housing.
• We are against planning and development, which isn’t integrated, controlled & accountable.
• That viewpoint makes this a National rather than a local issue, as the solution has to be implemented at National level.

Delivery of external and internal infrastructure, needs to be co-ordinated by a national body so the socio-economic and civic environment can support the new and existing communities.

e.g. The delivery of Roads, trains, flood management, jobs etc need to be delivered for development just as well as water and sewage and houses.

We welcome SDCC’s attempt to plan in a more holistic fashion. But the aspiration in their plan isn’t worth the paper it’s written on, unless the external infrastructure on which their plan clearly depends, is delivered, and more importantly controls the timeframes and the manner in which the internal Adamstown solution is planned & developed. You cannot plan in isolation.

SDCC have told us they cannot provide the type of controlled checkpoints and approach that we are asking for, so we need a new type of approach to the process.

It’s time development was controlled by all the stakeholders involved, not just the private developers.

You can’t just drop a town the size of Tralee, into the existing landscape, over a period of 7 years, without managing the internal and external infrastructure required to support the new and exisiting communities. The challenges presented are heightened, when you recognise that :

• Adamstown will support the population of Tralee in a space the size of Lutrellstown Golfcourse, an area smaller than the area of Tralee.
• Adamstown on it’s own will increase the population of Lucan by a further two-thirds.
• The immediate landscape into which Adamstown will emerge, is already problematic with chronic traffic and flood management issues, and inadequate amenities.
• The impact of Adamstown will extend beyond the geographic boundaries of SDCC’s jurisdiction and responsibility. The real physical world in which we live does not have these boundaries, and when we plan and develop, it’s the real world we have to take account of. – We need to consider for example what’s happening in Kildare, how many people will be on
• the trains and the N4 before they hit Lucan or Clondalkin….??? and what do we need to serve all these needs….

A new type of approach and a new structure giving control, visibility and accountability across all the bodies which need to be involved to make the development work, and including the public. This body needs to be really empowered, and to work on a number of levels, and be accountable across successive Governments.

We applaud the efforts of the current Minister for the Environment who is driving initiatives to promote the development of infrastructure and provision for housing, through a series of initiatives to revitalise our service provision across bodies such as the DTO, County Councils etc. We’d like to see him take this one step further in the context of managing the delivery and co-ordinating the efforts for developments. We want to take our proposal to him.

While our planners can say ‘Planning is only planning’ , and we don’t co-ordinate, control and manage the delivery of those plans, we might as well put the money aside now, to tear down Adamstown, and pay for the tribunals to investigate the disaster.

We don’t want to have to spend our lives fighting to make every proposal work, we want an effective mechanism and watchdog to ensure that is done for us.

This is our homes they are playing with, our lives that will be impacted every day by ill-considered and uncontrolled development. No one has the right to compromise our quality of life, or more importantly that of future generations.

The ability of our socio-economic and civic landscape to absorb further mistakes is fast eroding.

This is as much an issue for Limerick, Galway, Waterford and every town or city in Ireland which is growing in a rapid, uncontrolled fashion. We want to work with likeminded organisations. Let’s make every effort to make these developments a success.

Conway Smyth (Griffeen Flood Action Group)