Louth councillor calls for no more high density housing in parts of Dundalk South

Cllr Shane McGuinness has called on Louth County Council to “no longer consider any high-density housing model of any kind in the Dundalk South Area of Haggardstown, Dromiskin, Knockbridge, Blackrock or Castlebellingham for the forseeable future”, until the local authority is “satisfied first that our two WWTP (Waste Water Treatment Plants) can facilitate further large scale housing before and lands are zone High Denisty in any form”.

Cllr McGuinness made the call in a motion at the Louth County Council July meeting, and following the meeting explained his reasoning to the Dundalk Democrat.

The Fianna Fáil councillor said that Dundalk South has the biggest electorate of all the five local electoral areas in Louth.
Dundalk South has a population of 38,195 according to Census 2022, 12,103 more than Dundalk- Carlingford, for example.

Cllr McGuinness said that Dundalk South provides the most money from rates, with the likes of WuXi, industrial estates, hotels, etc all located in the area, as well as “the highest amount of money coming in, in terms of building levies, and yet, when it comes to dishing out the funding, we have been left behind”.

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“The reason for that” , he continued, “is that there hasn't been a local councillor in Blackrock and Haggardstown for over 15 years”, referring to previous councillors, Jim D'Arcy and Donal Lynch. 

“Whenever you don't have somebody fighting for your locality”, he continued, “you don't get anything, and politics is local, andthat's the reason I actually got into politics, for that reason. We have an emergency situation in Blackrock and Haggardstown in particular, because we have no sewerage capacity.”

Explaining his motion, he said that “what I'm saying is, any areas we have a serious capacity issue with our infrastructure, we shouldn't even consider high density housing. 

"I'm a very very common sense politician. I'm a health and safety consultant, but I've also a background in construction, so I understand the way things work. I'm saying we should keep it as a low density. The motion was for me to really drive it home that we have a serious problem.

“What Irish Water is now saying to developers is, we want you to put in your own external wastewater treatment systems.
“I'm saying this is Third World stuff. Why can they not upgrade the plant at Cocklehill, spend the three or four million, and let the builders pay that money. Rather than a tanker – it comes every week with the external ones and empties human sludge out every week.”

Outlining what he believes is necessary, Cllr McGuinness said that “until the National Development Plan, and the money comes through - I met Minister James Browne and Minister Jack Chambers and pleaded with them to allocate the money for a wastewater treatment plant [upgrade] - until we get that, I don't want Louth County Council to be issuing high density housing to any developer.”