Galway County Council is ‘confident’ that resubmitted plans for the City Ring Road will secure the approval of An Bord Pleanála.

Delivery of thousands of pages of planning files to the board’s Dublin office is expected in the coming days, ahead of an April 16 deadline to provide further information on the plan.

And Director of Services, Uinsinn Finn, says while the overall plan remains the same, these plans requested by An Bord Pleanála provide updated environmental, geological and bat surveys – as well as explanations by the local authority as to how the Ring Road would, in their view, comply with climate action legislation.

In December 2021, An Bord Pleanála approved, with a number of conditions and modifications, the Ring Road proposal but following three sets of proceedings taken to the High Court, this decision was quashed in January 2023 and the application was remitted to the Board.

The High Court took this decision after it was found that, in approving the project, An Bord Pleanála had failed to consider the State’s newly enacted Climate Action Plan.

As a result, the Board issued a further information request to Galway County Council – the lead authority for the 18km route working with Galway City Council and Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) – seeking clarification on how the road could be delivered in line with climate action objectives.

Mr Finn said the application was first submitted in 2018 and, as a result, many of the surveys, reports and investigations needed to be updated.

“The original application was submitted in 2018 and the environmental surveys done for that were probably completed in 2016, so all surveys – bat surveys, ecological, groundwater, etc – all had to be redone and all associated documentation updated.

“Take, for example, the bat surveys. We have to identify where they roost and feed, and to ensure that the construction of the road doesn’t affect their habitat. We have to know what potential changes have occurred – there could be new roosting sites,” he said.

“The other piece was for us to inform An Bord Pleanála of our view as to how the Ring Road will comply with the latest climate action legislation,” he continued.

The substantive plan remains unchanged, said Mr Finn – an 18km stretch of double (12km) and single (6km) carriageway, from the existing N6 road (from Dublin) at Coolagh on the east side of the city, to a point west of Barna village, and including a new bridge over the River Corrib.

There had been a number of delays getting the updated plan to this stage, he conceded, and commitments to submit to An Bord Pleanála before last Christmas were not met.

“One thing that happened was the publication of the report on light rail,” he said, referring to the NTA’s feasibility study which found light rail was a viable option for Galway.

“When the Minister published that last November, we were almost ready to submit our plan but that then had to be taken into consideration,” said Mr Finn.

That meant new traffic modelling had to be done which took into account a scenario in the future where light rail was part of Galway’s transport network.

Mr Finn said the Council was “confident and hopeful” that An Bord Pleanála would grant permission, but said it was likely that the final decision would be taken by the courts.

“Ultimately, this will be decided by a High Court judge and that is why we had to update all our plans,” he said.

Pictured: A new bridge over the River Corrib is one of the key elements of the ring road plan.