News and views on Greystones harbour and marina [SEE MODERATOR WARNING POST 1187]

F3

With regard to the erosion on the north cliffs this is what was prescribed [Courtesy of Mr. B Millar Facebook]:

Here's what WCC and Sispar (Sisk) committed to do but abandoned doing EIGHT years ago:

Giving evidence to the oral inquiry on behalf of Sispar/WCC, expert witness Clon Ulrick, BSc(Eng) Ceng MICE MIStructE, stated, inter alia:

4.6 The coastal protection scheme consists of:

• A partially buried revetment to protect the landfill site, approximate length 180 m

• Capital beach nourishment of 30,000m3 shingle to provide for the initial effects of the construction of the marine works on the cliffs further north

• Maintenance nourishment to provide managed cliff toe retreat for 30 years.

This retreat will be on average be less than the current retreat rate between Bray Head and Greystones over the design life of the coastal defences.

This beach nourishment is expected to be up to 6,000m3 annually. It is clear from this that there are two forms of beach nourishment in the coastal defences.

One is capital beach nourishment, the initial quantity needed to counteract the effects of construction of the marine works.

The other is regular, annual maintenance nourishment, up to 6,000m3, to limit erosion of the cliffs below the existing known annual rate. This rate is established as 600 millimetres per year average

Later, in section 5.4 Coastal protection, Mr Ulrick outlined three separate coastal protection measures:

5.5.1 Capital nourishment: It will be necessary to place some initial beach nourishment to minimise the impact of initial changes to the coastline during construction. It is proposed that 30,000 m3 will be placed during the construction of the breakwaters.

5.5.2 Maintenance nourishment: It is proposed that up to 6,000 m3 per year will be placed from the Gap Bridge to 850 m further north. The 6,000 m3 provides for a factor of safety of 1.5 on the modelled erosion rates shown on Figure 8. 5.5.3

Harvesting of up to 25,000 m3 of material accreted at the new north beach may be carried out over the 30 year concession period to further reduce peak erosion rate near the Gap Bridge.

...Quoted from Appendix 3 of the original 2005 EIS concerned with coastal protection...

Fiachra2

I see that Wicklow County Council or Sisk have now adorned the harbour with a nice metal container located in the site where the community clubhouses were to be built. Thanks guys. With the summer coming its nice of you to think of new ways to make the place as ugly as possible.

legrand

Fiachra2 wrote: »

I see that Wicklow County Council or Sisk have now adorned the harbour with a nice metal container located in the site where the community clubhouses were to be built. Thanks guys. With the summer coming its nice of you to think of new ways to make the place as ugly as possible.

Put in about 2 weeks ago. I noticed a gentleman associated with the Anglers coordinating the delivery with the truck driver - no idea where the connection is however.

pixbyjohn

North Pier Path by pixbyjohn, on Flickr

gibbon6

pixbyjohn wrote: »

North Pier Path by pixbyjohn, on Flickr

Sisks should be putting in a boardwalk on top of the ugly pilings. The new path is just another cheapskate gesture from Sisks in keeping with the ugly appearance of this "world-class facility". :mad:

recedite

F3 wrote: »

5.5.2 Maintenance nourishment: It is proposed that up to 6,000 m3 per year will be placed from the Gap Bridge to 850 m further north.

That stipulation was obviously to protect the public amenity land (the proposed linear park)
The gravel they are putting in now is being placed way south of there. It will only serve as a temporary protection for the privately owned Sisk site. If they can keep the site intact until after the apartments are built, it will be someone else's problem from then on.

Fiachra2

We are almost at 250K views! Can some one write something controversial and start a row and we'll be there by tonight !

LEIN

Fiachra2 wrote: »

We are almost at 250K views! Can some one write something controversial and start a row and we'll be there by tonight !

What?

legrand

I think a giant brass [necked] statue of a certain FG councilor should be erected on north breakwater with a red jacket casually draped over his shoulder and carrying a copy of Wicklow Times in his other hand as he gazes over the 8th wonder of world.

F3

I see some good recent comments on GUBOH Face book which i'll post here:

John Gerrard: It is a scandal. The public have lost a once beautiful beach. The small angular pebbles dumped by Sisks on the North Beach over the last week or so could easily be washed away in one major storm event. The new breakwaters as predicted by the experts in the EIS have resulted in beach starvation of the north beach as the sediment flows have been blocked. The increased wave energy on the beach has increased erosion on the cliffs. The evidence is stark. The North beach level has lowered by 9 feet since 2008 and the cliffs have eroded by by 4 metres in the last 7 months alone. To stand any chance of protecting the beach and cliffs they really needed to place a sufficient quantity of decent sized stones on the beach such as the beach nourishment material placed on Bray beach. Sisks were supposed to place 30k cubic metres on beach nourishment material on the beach when the breakwaters were being constructed. They only placed 10k cubic metres. Wicklow County Council completely ignored this.

John O'Brien This is the real issue John Gerrard, WCC have failed to enforce the stipulations of the EIS and ABP. This amounts to € hundreds and hundreds of thousands. The effect, is that we have prematurely lost a significant amount of foreshore, for the sake of a private company making savings with the blessing of WCC. The question is why? Who has profited? Certainly not the people of Greystones. What gets on my wick, is that our local so called public representatives condone this illegitimately gleaned profit. Just watch who will be first to come out and praise the recent "effort" occurring on site and completely glaze over the wrongs that have occurred and completely ignore the profits gleaned by unfair means.

John O'Brien: WCC are the enforcement body. I recently spoke with the Central Government department who issues foreshore licenses nationally. They explained that under the route chosen by WCC to procure this project, they did not need a regular foreshore license, but are completely responsible for the enforcement of ABP conditions and those of the EIS. Off the record, the Engineer whom I spoke was appalled with what has transpired at the North beach, he added on the basis of what he had seen, if his department had granted the license, they would be looking to terminate the license by ministerial order immediately. He cannot understand why WCC are not enforcing the stringent obligations on Sispar. He said unfortunately his department cannot intervene.

John O'Brien: WCC are on the back foot. I know that strong letters have followed Tom Fortunes from local TD's directly into WCC executive, and the responses received are [as expected] babbling bull****! Their responses harp on about the market change, and that Sispar have been progressing not stop since the market downturn, they point out to the efforts made on investigating the viability of the Primary Care Centre and as far as they are concerned the project has never stalled. HOWEVER, THEY FORGET [or at least are trying to obfuscate the facts to the ignorant or unwary] ONE TINY POINT........

John O'Brien: .......Which is, Sicon [The Parent company of Sispar and Sisk] have guaranteed the funding of the project from start to finish. What this means, is regardless of external funding problems by AIB [the projects funders, where all loans over €5m automatically went into NAMA] has no effect whatsoever on the progression of the project. Simply put, SICON have a contractual obligation to fund the project from start to finish without stopping. So, Why has WCC not used this stick to beat Sispar????? Why are they trying to fudge the market change with the funding obligations???? Do WCC think that they will fool the TD's?? Do WCC think that they will fool us???

John O'Brien: If SICON cannot fund the project from start to finish in accordance with the project contract programme of works, then Sisparts contract should be determined. It should have been determined a long time ago if this is the case. You don't fool us WCC!! You may take comfort in the shield that Greystones Town Councillors have freely offered for the past 5 years, but no more.

John O'Brien: We all have an obligation not to allow this talk shop to perpetuate in the new municipal district town council. We must ensure that those who fully and unequivocally have demonstrated that our concerns are heard at the highest level are elected. BUT PLEASE PLEASE DO NOT ALLOW those empty minded idiots who are so blinded by their own careers and importance to be re-elected.

John O'Brien: What concerns me also, is that at least one of the new Cllrs elect, is already blinded by the influence of the old. There appears to be no talking to him, another know it all i'm afraid. Let us be mindful that these people choose to undertake a public job to represent public opinion. They are neither qualified nor experienced to give thier own professional opinion on such matters, and if the responses received from WCC are beyond their comprehension, then they should return with the message to the members of our community that do possess the experience and qualifications to decipher the responses and instruct a rebuttal accordingly, to which they carry the message back. Where the process continuously falls down is that they believe that they know better. Well, we as a group have continually spoken and explained in detail to pretty much all of the Greystones TC's for three years, and all I can say, is Oh my God is it any wonder we are in this mess!!! Its our fault for electing these really really ignorant and arrogant people.........YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE WHEN YOU READ THIS...........I'M STILL WAITING FOR YOU TO CHALLENGE & DEBATE ANYTHING I SAY, IN A PUBLIC FORUM WHICH WILL BE VIDEOED AND PUBLISHED FOR ALL TO SEE..............

gibbon6

Costly and unsustainable beach nourishment projects are never required where human structures, such as the two large breakwaters at Greystones Harbour, don't exist. With natural beaches, erosion does not endanger the beach itself. The shoreline at Greystones North Beach has eroded for thousands of years, yet the beach remained, because it could change its shape and position naturally. The enormous level of erosion only became a problem when the new breakwaters were built. The breakwaters blocked the sediment flow along the shoreline thus starving the beach. The level of the Greystones North beach has fallen by three metres since the breakwaters were built which amounts to the loss of 285,000 cubic metres of beach material. The paltry amounts of material that Sispar are now placing on the beach are insignificant compared to the volume of beach material lost because of the construction of the breakwaters.

jpd

gibbon6 wrote: »

... With natural beaches, erosion does not endanger the beach itself. The shoreline at Greystones North Beach has eroded for thousands of years, yet the beach remained, because it could change its shape and position naturally. The enormous level of erosion only became a problem when the new breakwaters were built. The breakwaters blocked the sediment flow along the shoreline thus starving the beach...

Does anyone know where the sediment is going, if not onto the North beach?

Is the South beach is getting bigger, the sea floor is filling up or Bray is receiving more sediment than before?

recedite

Good question. I was told by a diver that the sea floor off Greystones is less interesting now than it used to be. A few years ago it was rocky, like the rocks you would see on the shore just across from St Davids school. This would be one or two hundred metres out, I think.
Now it is sandy.

gibbon6

recedite wrote: »

Good question. I was told by a diver that the sea floor off Greystones is less interesting now than it used to be. A few years ago it was rocky, like the rocks you would see on the shore just across from St Davids school. This would be one or two hundred metres out, I think.
Now it is sandy.

So the sediment that used to replenish the North Beach is now being blocked by the two new breakwaters.

loyatemu

jpd wrote: »

Does anyone know where the sediment is going, if not onto the North beach?

Is the South beach is getting bigger

it's currently the biggest I can remember with sand going right past St David's school. The diving board at the Men's is completely covered with sand.

A lot of this will probably be washed out again when we next have a easterly storm but more generally the South Beach is a lot bigger than it was when I was a kid - the grassy dunes at the top of the beach have developed because the sea never comes up that far anymore - it used to reach all the way to the walkway during very high tides, but I don't think you can blame the harbour development for that.

recedite

Well the sediment comes off the cliffs themselves. AFAIK it tends to shift "longshore drift" up and down the beach, parallel to the shore, depending on the seasons and the tides. But the sea walls jutting out into the sea have the effect of concentrating the amount of water that is forced to pass just outside the harbour, thus increasing the speed of the current there. So this scouring effect pushes the sediment further out to sea where it settles. Once settled out there, it does not go back in the opposite direction when the winds/tide change, as it used to.

If this was happening, then you would expect to see a sandbank appear further out, eventually, and then an island. It happened in Dublin when they built the Bull Wall jutting out. Bull island appeared over the following decades.
Interestingly from the link, back then they had Captain Bligh of the Bounty sailing around monitoring the situation and taking depth readings. And of course out here we had the great engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel taking measurements along the north beach and the cliff path for his Bray to Greystones railway.
Nowadays we have diddly squat official monitoring, just a few boardsies comparing photos.

Off the record, the Engineer whom I spoke was appalled with what has transpired at the North beach, he added on the basis of what he had seen, if his department had granted the license, they would be looking to terminate the license by ministerial order immediately. He cannot understand why WCC are not enforcing the stringent obligations on Sispar. He said unfortunately his department cannot intervene.

I mean that is disgusting; local govt. refusing to take responsibility, and national govt. refusing to intervene. Have we really become such a banana republic over the last 100 years?

F3

recedite wrote: »

I mean that is disgusting; local govt. refusing to take responsibility, and national govt. refusing to intervene. Have we really become such a banana republic over the last 100 years?

Yes we have. I see it every day. We have become a country overrun by the unions and civil servants both of whom are essentially untouchable for accountability.

No government will intervene and hold persons or unions accountable for the fear of not being reelected.

Look at the croke park agreement FFS!

Look at the upwards only benchmarking.

Look at the fat cat golden handshakes given to Civil servants and the guilt edged pensions they retire on in their 50's!!

Look at ministers, TD's and civil servants not doing any real work whatsoever and farming out executions to private faceless consultants.

The local authorities are like the CIA, governments may come and go, but the executives in the 29 Local authorities remain.

The most powerful organisation in this country be in no doubt is the Association of County Managers, these people really believe they are untouchable and you know what, they feck'n are.

You or I alone cannot bring them to account, our local politicians are compromised from the off. TD and ministers are given the two fingers as their time is short, and nothing will be done to upset the gravy train, and they know it.

Where has our pride gone? Where has our voice gone. We are IRISH FFS!!! Show some fight!!

The rest of the world are in awe as to why the Irish taxpayer has not started a revolution on what we've had to endure with corruption and incompetence in our governments and in our local authorities.

Enough is enough......

F3

I read in the times over the weekend, a banner headline that describes Irish politics and senior civil servants after another week of turmoil. It read

"If institutional Ireland were a stick of rock, the words ‘loyalty is prized above honesty’ would run through it. Irish authorities always choose loyalty"

LEIN

F3 wrote: »

I read in the times over the weekend, a banner headline that describes Irish politics and senior civil servants after another week of turmoil. It read

"If institutional Ireland were a stick of rock, the words ‘loyalty is prized above honesty’ would run through it. Irish authorities always choose loyalty"

I feel that this style of posting is better suited to the political forum, if you wish to continue, I suggest that you start a thread there.

legrand

I guess access to the north breakwater may be imminent. I am delighted and much relieved to note that the pathway will be further enhanced with fencing on landward side lest anyone suffer from vertigo and heaven forbid fall onto to waste ground. FFS!

Cerco

I thought this whole harbour development was on track for completion. Once the PCC is built it should be plain sailing. I understand WCC and Sisk are committed ....according to the Town Council anyway.

Anybody have a timeline?

Fiachra2

Cerco wrote: »

I thought this whole harbour development was on track for completion. Once the PCC is built it should be plain sailing. I understand WCC and Sisk are committed ....according to the Town Council anyway.

Anybody have a timeline?

Where do we start?!!

The PCC was abandoned over a year ago (Well probably about three years ago to tell the truth)

According to the TC Santa Clause exists.

No one has a time line. (Certainly not one that can be believed)

Sorry Crrco I am being flippant. I suggest just reading the last couple of month posts.

F3

We have spoken to all of the running candidates at this stage, and all but 2 candidates [that are re-running] are fully behind the community plan.

What was quite amazing, is that some of them believed that the community plan was a complete alternative to finishing the entire development! It most certainly is not, and NEVER has been!

I would like to correct this misnomer again, so that nobody is in any doubt:

Late last summer, we invited everybody to send in suggestions of what they would like to see as temporary improvements to the vast ugly building site surrounded by pallisade fencing until the building commenced and to be phased thereafter so that a balance was struck between the protrated phased building programme and an acceptable amenity for the town to enjoy. The cliff walk for example is a "stoned turd track" and yet is a key artery for visitors to enter our town.

The community plan is the collection and correlation of hundreds and hundreds of ideas that came flooding in. We did not go to individual groups or clubs or resident associations, it was simply open to everybody.[a feeble comment being used by some candidates for supporting a veto to the plan]

The repetition of suggestions over a number of weeks that came in from our community was quite astounding, and we put together all of the top suggestions and we professionally valued the net cost of Sisk carrying out the work.

The community plan therefore, became a pretty accurate set of requirements to enhance the amenity which would could be implemented immediately, and then progressively replaced with the permanent building as the phases are completed.

It is designed so that everybody wins.

Sisk would get the time they require to complete the building of the harbour over a longer period than what they were contracted to complete, but without the protest from the community as they would be compensated with an acceptable temporary amenity.

When we published the community plan in September, some Greystones Town Councillors indulged in propaganda and attacked the viability and costs of the plan, publicising that it would cost €13,000,000 and have years and years of planning problems. [Why oh why would our public representatives do that??] However, we addressed every single item raised, and had a professional costing report undertaken [68 pages including appendices] and we published it.

The net cost of implementing this interim plan in its entirety for the next 3 years to Sisk was only €500k and could be implemented without any planning conditions*. [*actually there was one aspect which was a community band-stand for small out door summer gigs which would have required planning, but obviously it was not essential to the implementation of the plan]

At no time to date, has the professionally drafted and costed community plan been objectively discussed or addressed by TC's, WCC or Sisk with the drafters.

A meeting was agreed in December to have all the Area TD's, WCC and Sisk together with the TC's in a public forum to discuss its viability and implementation with the professionals that costed the community plan in January 2014. After this meeting was agreed, it was [behind closed doors] scuppered by one particular Town Cllr acting upon either a party whip or a WCC whip], but the meeting never happened.

The community plan, or indeed significant parts of it could be implemented easily at very little cost to Sisk, but they have been protected by most of our current TC's and WCC.

The community have essentially been told to "go whistle dixie".

What is good however, is that all of the new candidates have been briefed on the merits and costs of the community plan, and most are in shock as to why the exiting TC veto'd the plan.

Taltos

Do we have a clear list of which of these candidates support the community plan (and will agree to having their names listed as supporting), as well as a clear list of those that either rejected, abstained or will not support the plan?

F3

Taltos wrote: »

Do we have a clear list of which of these candidates support the community plan (and will agree to having their names listed as supporting), as well as a clear list of those that either rejected, abstained or will not support the plan?

Hi Taltos, its kind of a difficult thing to do so close to the election, as each candidate [of course] is already manifesting support of everything to do with improving the current state of the harbour. What we could do is name those who have by their actions or inactions have created the obstacles to which I refer.

F3

GUBOH have an amazing team of committed professional people who have uncovered and digested much information on what was tendered by WCC. The Contract however, was modified before being finalised with Sisk. And this modification is a closely guarded secret by WCC. However, we feel that they do so only to create a backdrop retreat position because the most fundamental requirement remains and that was confirmed recently by Sean Quirke.

Sicon, the parent company of Sisk/Sispar, have committed to a parent company guarantee for funding the project from start to finish.

What this means, is that regardless of the banking crisis with the original funder which led to the intervention of NAMA, we see Sicon as being contractually bound to fund the entire project from start to finish, with no breaks, or suspension in the programme.

And thus, Sisk have been allowed by WCC to stall the project for almost 4 years now.

Sisk have also been allowed not to spend the very significant annual contingent liability [hundreds of thousands of euro per annum] in controlling the erosion to the north beach, and we have lost much of the headland, far far far beyond what was allowable.

WCC and certain TC’s have tried to publicly obfuscate the line between the ‘market change’ clause [which they also confirmed was in the amended contract] and the obligation by Sicon to fund the project.

In reality, there is no conflict, nor indeed complexity.

Cllr. Tom Fortune eventually got to see the clause, [albeit was expressly told he was not allowed to write it out verbatim, nor was he allowed to bring an expert in to review the clause and its connected clauses] and essentially the market change clause allows Sisk if the market falls continuously for a period of 12 months, to make an application to WCC to change the development to suit the down turn. For example, change from commercial units to more housing units etc. Sisk did just that, but what they threw into the equation was a change to include a primary care centre. We all know the PCC is now not going ahead, and [not surprisingly] was probably never going to go ahead. The PCC in Greystones was never listed by the HSE in its national list of imminent PCC projects & despite the community asking why not, we were fed a long line of bulls**t!! . Sisk finally reported back, having strung the TC and community along for almost 3 years that it was going to happen, that funding would not allow this PCC to be built. They succeeded in stalling the project for almost 3 years on this one point. Go back to the Sicon funding guarantee……..their excuse doesn’t make contractual sense does it?? It was plainly used by Sisk [tolerated by both WCC and out TC] as a stalling tactic to allow the market to recover.

WCC have adopted the position, that the project has never stalled due to this ongoing investigation by Sisk into the PCC. How can this be so I ask? If the PCC failed according to Sisk on the basis of not being able to secure funding, then why not fund it by the parent company guarantee from Sicon??? You can now appreciate why we do not believe a word from WCC.

Secondly, Sisk were given [by way of a gift by our County Manager] 34 additional sites free of charge, more than 2 years ago, to ‘make the project viable’. Two things occur here, (1) The sites were taken from what should have been the community park, and (2) even if they were gifted these sites under the market change clause, then that was on the basis that they continued to build without stalling the programme.

[By the way we conservatively estimate the value of these additional sites at between €15 and €17 million euro,]

Sisk have stalled the programme now for almost 4 years, taken the €17million in sites [thanks WCC!!] and not spent the money to protect our beach and cliffs. [which by the way weve lost the 15m of beach that once was present*

[*Refer to the extensive reporting by John Gerrard]

Now that the market for housing has turned a corner [and housing is in demand again in Greystones], they have decided to build and sell the houses [nothing else] and harvest the huge profits. With no sign or commitment to completing everything else.

Will they sort out the erosion in compliance to ABP and EIS? Seems not – what they have done is superficial and in contravention of the aforesaid documents.

Will they implement elements of the community plan? NO – they do not want to spend any money, and no-body is making them except the supporters of the community plan.

They simply want the profit or to minimise their losses. And why shouldn’t they? If WCC allows it, and our own Town Council heretofore has allowed it, they indeed why shouldn’t they [well done Sisk!!!]

So, what can be done? Well WCC are the enforcing authority, and ought not have allowed Sisk to behave in the manner in which they have. They have a power to instruct Sisk to perform and if Sisk do not, or cannot by a deficit in funding [guaranteed by Sicon] then they are in default under the terms of their contract and can be determined [contract terminated]

What happens here is crystal clear in the documents we have digested:

[Supposing Sisk has spent €80million to date]

WCC terminate the contract, and go out again to Europe to seek tenders from companies to finish the PPP.

Essentially other European Companies are bidding for c400 mixed use sites, building out the infrastructure, and running the scheme for a 30 year concession period.

Say the highest bid WCC receive from tender’s is €65million, then WCC are allowed to offset any costs they have incurred by Sisks default event [that gave rise to a breach of contract and triggered the termination [lack of funding for example] ] say this is €4million, then, Sisk are simply handed back €61million with no further liability to WCC whatsoever. Sisk then lose €19million [80 million less 65 million less 4 million for WCC = 19 million], which is perfectly acceptable and a condition of the contract they tendered, and I am 99.9999999999% sure contracted!

Why has WCC not done just that and saved our community to endure a building site and lack of amenity for 4 years????

Who knows, but our elected representatives heretofore, have allowed them to do just that.

Maudi

Greystones people have been pretty much "bitch slapped" by sisk and wcc over the last couple years..sisk and wcc should be ran from the harbour.

Honestly!

F3 wrote: »

GUBOH have an amazing team of committed professional people who have uncovered and digested much information on what was tendered by WCC. The Contract however, was modified before being finalised with Sisk. And this modification is a closely guarded secret by WCC. However, we feel that they do so only to create a backdrop retreat position because the most fundamental requirement remains and that was confirmed recently by Sean Quirke.

Sicon, the parent company of Sisk/Sispar, have committed to a parent company guarantee for funding the project from start to finish.

What this means, is that regardless of the banking crisis with the original funder which led to the intervention of NAMA, we see Sicon as being contractually bound to fund the entire project from start to finish, with no breaks, or suspension in the programme.

And thus, Sisk have been allowed by WCC to stall the project for almost 4 years now.

Sisk have also been allowed not to spend the very significant annual contingent liability [hundreds of thousands of euro per annum] in controlling the erosion to the north beach, and we have lost much of the headland, far far far beyond what was allowable.

WCC and certain TC’s have tried to publicly obfuscate the line between the ‘market change’ clause [which they also confirmed was in the amended contract] and the obligation by Sicon to fund the project.

In reality, there is no conflict, nor indeed complexity.

Cllr. Tom Fortune eventually got to see the clause, [albeit was expressly told he was not allowed to write it out verbatim, nor was he allowed to bring an expert in to review the clause and its connected clauses] and essentially the market change clause allows Sisk if the market falls continuously for a period of 12 months, to make an application to WCC to change the development to suit the down turn. For example, change from commercial units to more housing units etc. Sisk did just that, but what they threw into the equation was a change to include a primary care centre. We all know the PCC is now not going ahead, and [not surprisingly] was probably never going to go ahead. The PCC in Greystones was never listed by the HSE in its national list of imminent PCC projects & despite the community asking why not, we were fed a long line of bulls**t!! . Sisk finally reported back, having strung the TC and community along for almost 3 years that it was going to happen, that funding would not allow this PCC to be built. They succeeded in stalling the project for almost 3 years on this one point. Go back to the Sicon funding guarantee……..their excuse doesn’t make contractual sense does it?? It was plainly used by Sisk [tolerated by both WCC and out TC] as a stalling tactic to allow the market to recover.

WCC have adopted the position, that the project has never stalled due to this ongoing investigation by Sisk into the PCC. How can this be so I ask? If the PCC failed according to Sisk on the basis of not being able to secure funding, then why not fund it by the parent company guarantee from Sicon??? You can now appreciate why we do not believe a word from WCC.

Secondly, Sisk were given [by way of a gift by our County Manager] 34 additional sites free of charge, more than 2 years ago, to ‘make the project viable’. Two things occur here, (1) The sites were taken from what should have been the community park, and (2) even if they were gifted these sites under the market change clause, then that was on the basis that they continued to build without stalling the programme.

[By the way we conservatively estimate the value of these additional sites at between €15 and €17 million euro,]

Sisk have stalled the programme now for almost 4 years, taken the €17million in sites [thanks WCC!!] and not spent the money to protect our beach and cliffs. [which by the way weve lost the 15m of beach that once was present*

[*Refer to the extensive reporting by John Gerrard]

Now that the market for housing has turned a corner [and housing is in demand again in Greystones], they have decided to build and sell the houses [nothing else] and harvest the huge profits. With no sign or commitment to completing everything else.

Will they sort out the erosion in compliance to ABP and EIS? Seems not – what they have done is superficial and in contravention of the aforesaid documents.

Will they implement elements of the community plan? NO – they do not want to spend any money, and no-body is making them except the supporters of the community plan.

They simply want the profit or to minimise their losses. And why shouldn’t they? If WCC allows it, and our own Town Council heretofore has allowed it, they indeed why shouldn’t they [well done Sisk!!!]

So, what can be done? Well WCC are the enforcing authority, and ought not have allowed Sisk to behave in the manner in which they have. They have a power to instruct Sisk to perform and if Sisk do not, or cannot by a deficit in funding [guaranteed by Sicon] then they are in default under the terms of their contract and can be determined [contract terminated]

What happens here is crystal clear in the documents we have digested:

[Supposing Sisk has spent €80million to date]

WCC terminate the contract, and go out again to Europe to seek tenders from companies to finish the PPP.

Essentially other European Companies are bidding for c400 mixed use sites, building out the infrastructure, and running the scheme for a 30 year concession period.

Say the highest bid WCC receive from tender’s is €65million, then WCC are allowed to offset any costs they have incurred by Sisks default event [that gave rise to a breach of contract and triggered the termination [lack of funding for example] ] say this is €4million, then, Sisk are simply handed back €61million with no further liability to WCC whatsoever. Sisk then lose €19million [80 million less 65 million less 4 million for WCC = 19 million], which is perfectly acceptable and a condition of the contract they tendered, and I am 99.9999999999% sure contracted!

Why has WCC not done just that and saved our community to endure a building site and lack of amenity for 4 years????

Who knows, but our elected representatives heretofore, have allowed them to do just that.

F3, Wasn't it the original position that Sispar had until 2014 to complete/resume or they had to handover the bond to WCC and leave? Now they can complete the apartments ONLY and take the money and run?

Why are Fine Gael and Fianna Fail, the parties who supported the handing over of the beach to developers (and every other large developer project, in fairness) not informing people what is going on? (By that, I mean, other than the repetitive Derek Mitchell junk mail telling us how this is the greatest harbour in all of Europe!) The onus is on those who proposed this to get it resolved now. It's interesting that (Mr. Europe), Simon Harris, who originally was against the project has now toed the party line and appears in local FG material applauding the "development". Other than Independents like Tom Fortune, Donnolly and Sinn Fein, it seems we have nobody to represent us politically on these issues? Are Labour doing anything?

Also, there is no reason whatsoever why the tonnes of sand due to be deposited in the North beach every year cannot be deposited. The North beach is a despicable eyesore and unusable.

No other country in Europe would allow this mess go on so long!

legrand

Thanks F3 for the detailed insight.

I don't believe for a minute that the TC thought the communiuty plan was meant to replace the development. A case of oops, election coming up - how do we back track from our decison to veto/give 2 fingers to the community [plan].

FF candidiate called to my door and mentioned he met with Guboh. He made no mention of supporting the community plan. He did say it was a 'constructive' meeting but (paraphrasing here) "some of them are have very trenchant views" - that I presume would be you then F3! And he said that is such a way (in my view) as to suggest he understood where Guboh were coming from but that he favoured more dialog with Sisk. I get the impression he felt Guboh were being a bit too hard on Sisk. I reminded him that Guboh existed becase the TC failed to represent the community.

You know what? (and it pains me really) - at the end of the day no matter who gets elected I cannot see any real near term improvement in terms of the harbour as an amenity. And what's worse is that once the housing/commercial development gets started it will be even worse than what we are experiencing today. Bleak huh? And yea I am bitter, really really bitter.

F3

legrand wrote: »

Thanks F3 for the detailed insight.

I don't believe for a minute that the TC thought the communiuty plan was meant to replace the development. A case of oops, election coming up - how do we back track from our decison to veto/give 2 fingers to the community [plan].

FF candidiate called to my door and mentioned he met with Guboh. He made no mention of supporting the community plan. He did say it was a 'constructive' meeting but (paraphrasing here) "some of them are have very trenchant views" - that I presume would be you then F3! And he said that is such a way (in my view) as to suggest he understood where Guboh were coming from but that he favoured more dialog with Sisk. I get the impression he felt Guboh were being a bit too hard on Sisk. I reminded him that Guboh existed becase the TC failed to represent the community.

You know what? (and it pains me really) - at the end of the day no matter who gets elected I cannot see any real near term improvement in terms of the harbour as an amenity. And what's worse is that once the housing/commercial development gets started it will be even worse than what we are experiencing today. Bleak huh? And yea I am bitter, really really bitter.

Hi LG, not me who met FF recently, it was others from the group. I did meet with Tarah Hanley and Billy Norman and had a good interactive chat in December last year.

I did formally meet with Sisk Director with Tom Fortune and Stephen Donnelly in Leinster House, for that very reason to open up dialog on the community plan. He started and pretty much finished the meeting by saying "There is no point really in having this meeting, as the Town Council have rejected the Community Plan" where do you go from there?