Fine Gael Councillor Gerry Coyle pleaded with the planning section of Mayo County Council to have a second look at a planning application before refusing it, at the Belmullet electoral area meeting this week.
The application in question was for a house with garage and septic tank at Binghamstown, Ballina. Mr John McMyler, senior executive planner, told the meeting that one of the reasons for the refusal was that it would have a disproportionate effect on the natural characteristic of the landscape. Cllr Coyle inquired whether it was being refused because it was on an elevated site and Mr McMyler informed him that there had been a previous application on the site which was withdrawn, and during that process the planners told the applicant to look at a lower part of the site.
Cllr Coyle then told the meeting he could not understand the upcoming refusal. “It’s a plain field, I can’t understand it,” he said. “The family who want to build here have been away a long time and now they want to come back to where they are from. They were born in the old family home just up the road. We want to keep people out of the lower lands because they might get flooded and then we can’t let them go higher up. There are houses which will be higher up than this one, I just don’t understand, this is the field they have and where they want to live, will you please look at it again,” he pleaded.
