Mayo County Council will inspect all quarries in the county over the coming months after the Minister for the Environment signed the Planning and Development (Amendment ) Act 2000 which gives a new provision in order to deal with the regulation of quarries.
Senior planner with the council Iain Douglas told the planning SPC on Monday that because of this Act the council is “obliged to inspect every site and prepare a report”.
Barry Freeman from the planning department said that following this process there will be “an excellent record” of quarry sites in the county; with 130 quarries currently on the council’s radar.
Councillor Michael Burke said that out of the 130 quarries he believes that “only 25 to 30 are very active at the moment” in the county and others are small family run businesses.
Cllr Gerry Murray said that as the road network is difficult to maintain around quarries this review should determine the route selection that quarries intend to take. Cllr Damien Ryan and Cllr Al McDonnell concurred with this.
Cllr McDonnell also proposed that planners and management conduct this quarry review with a “common sense approach”.
