From this week’s Galway City Tribune – The city’s Heritage Officer, Dr Jim Higgins, called a halt to unauthorised works to a protected structure at the Mud Dock on Long Walk near Galway Harbour earlier this year.

Dr Higgins visited the site, along with a member of the City Council’s Planning Enforcement Department, on foot of several complaints from members of the public about works underway at the site.

The complaints alleged that two large Hitachi diggers removed a large area of soil and “dumped it on the foreshore”.

“Then the diggers proceeded to dredge the entire Mud Dock area,” according to a Planning Enforcement file released to the Galway City Tribune following a Freedom of Information (FOI) request.

When the two Council workers arrived at the scene, no works were ongoing, however, “the two excavators were present and excavation works had been underway abutting the dock wall”.

According to the file, the Mud Dock is a protected structure, and it is situated within Long Walk an Architectural Conservation Area.

This is a shortened preview version of this story. To read the rest of the article, see the December 30 edition of the Galway City Tribune. You can support our journalism by buying a digital edition HERE.