One decade after the Mullaghmore controversy first erupted, players from opposing sides recently met on the site of the ill-fated Mullaghmore interpretative centre in the Burren National Park in Co Clare to perform the final act in the drama.
Since last February, on foot of a High Court order secured by the Burren Action Group, Government contractors have been busy removing the last vestiges of the conflict - demolishing (at a cost of £800,000) the partially completed interpretative centre, car-park and sewage treatment works in the shadow of Mullaghmore mountain.
Where the centre and car-park once stood, there are now brown fields with the first blades of grass already appearing. Members of the action group, Prepresentatives of the Office of Public Works to inspect the site to ensure that everything was done to their satisfaction.
The irony of the meeting would not have been lost on the two men. In November, 1992, they were among a group of unwelcome protesters at the same site when supporters of the centre were witnessing the first sod for the interpretative centre being turned by local Fianna Fail TD, Brendan Daly.
To chants of shame, shame" from action group protesters, Daly held up a handful of clay and retorted: "solid gold".
Events following Daly's defiance show his claim to have been misguided. An estimated £3 million but the newly created fields are the only remaining evidence of the controversy.
After his tour of the restored site with OPW representatives, Curtis said: "It did bring tears to my eyes. I did cry. It was a very moving experience. They were asking us were we happy with the tree planting, with the contours. They have done an amazing job.
"I was both elated and sad at the same time. Elated because the centre has been removed and it will no longer be a scar on the landscape and in a very short time, the site will be reclaimed by nature and it is amazing to witness the first signs of that. I was sad for people who we have lost along the way, the likes of Cyril O'Ceirin, who gave so much and who was not around to see this."
Local farmer, Howard says: "It was an emotional day. Ten years is a long time to fight. We were proven right in what we did.It wasn't for ourselves that we did it, but for the generations to follow." The two were among members of a disparate group that came together to form the Burren Action Group in the spring of 1991 after Government plans for a visitor centre at Mullaghmore were unveiled.
Explaining the group's motivation to oppose the plan, author, and chairman of the action group, John O'Donoghue, said the group's opposition to the centre "was motivated by an old-fashioned, almost innocent love of a mountain" in one of the most sensitive parts of the Burren, which is world-renowned for its unique geology and flora.
At the time, Government agencies did not need planning permission for their developments and the £2.7 million proposal at Mullaghmore seemed a fait accompli when work commenced on the centre in December 1992.
In a bid to prevent it being completed, the action group took to the courts, which would eventually result in the most fundamental change in Irish planning legislation in 30 years.
Three months after work commenced, in response to action group proceedings, the High Court put in place an injunction on any further work on the centre, ruling that it was constitutionally invalid for the OPW not to be subject to the planning acts in the same way as members of the general public.
The OPW appealed the decision to the Supreme Court, however, the High Court's ruling was upheld.
One of the seven plaintiffs from the action group in the case, Leila Doolan says: "It is a difficult thing for people to take on the authority of the State and to stand up and say, 'this isn't right, you can do it another way'."
She adds: "Changing the law bringing the State authorities into line with the rest of the citizens so they would now also have to apply for planning permission was a very important and good thing. One of the other satisfying things is that an awful lot of people are a lot more aware of the countryside through the issue." The action group - which has consistently stated that such visitor facilities should be located in villages around the Burren - had secured a momentous victory.
Outside the legal process, however, the divisiveness that the dispute caused in the local community was taking its toll. Howard, one of those at the front line, says: "We lost a lot of friends, hopefully they will come back, a lot of good people too. It was a pity it happened. They had their opinion and we had ours. Now is a time for healing."
The Government, determined to press ahead with the plan, opened a new battle front in the conflict, when it lodged a planning application in January, 1994, which provided for a 12.5 per cent reduction in the size of the centre.
However, this fell along with the Fianna Fβil-Labour Government later that year and a revised application was lodged in October, 1996, by Heritage Minister, Michael D.Higgins. The dispute was then five years old. The loose structure of the action group allowed people to contribute intensely, or to drift in and out for particular periods, says group member, Joe Saunders.
"The structure remained loose deliberately, because we always felt that it would be a long campaign and for that reason, it would have been unfair to put people into officership positions that they couldn't sustain. We were opposing an organisation that was bureaucratic and hierarchical, and many of the people involved wanted to be the opposite of that."
A model for other community groups throughout the country, over the 10-year campaign, the action group raised and spent more than a quarter of a million pounds to fund the various legal and planning initiatives to prevent the plan from proceeding.
In September, 1998, it scored another victory when the revised planning application failed to receive the required number of votes from Clare County Council.the decision to An Bord Pleanβla.
The board's oral hearing in Ennis, in July, 1999, h was the first time the planning issues related to the proposal were debated in a public forum.
The board's decision, eight months later, refusing planning on a number of grounds, was a comprehensive endorsement of the views of the action group. One of the reasons for its refusal was that the development would constitute an unacceptable risk to the conservation of natural habitats and species in the core area of the national park.
Former chairperson of An Tβisce and action group member, Prof Emer Colleran says: "The An Bord Pleanβla result vindicated all of the work that we had done. It was using the normal process and it showed that the arguments that we made all along were right ".
The board's decision allowed the action group to go back into the High Court last July to secure the demolition of the partially completed centre, which was rendered illegal by the 1993 court decisions.
However, a reminder of the divisiveness of the dispute occured in February, when contractors attempting to enter the site were prevented by supporters of the original centre.
Secretary of the Kilnaboy Community Development Association, James Neylon, was one of the protesters. "The centre would have been good for Kilnaboy and the Burren in general and I still believe that. It was lost and we accepted it, but the tearing up of the car-park was unnecessary.
"The impression is given that there was a civil war in Kilnaboy, there wasn't. The vast majority of people in the community were in favour of the centre. I love the Burren as much as members of the action group claim to do. I don't agree with their views on the issue but you have to respect them."
Tony Killeen, the Fianna Fβil Deputy who lives "In a sense, the Burren National Park is not a national park in any meaningful sense because there is no access point. The site at Mullaghmore remains the only practical and the most suitable location for an access point to the park."
The protesters' blockade was lifted after five days, following intervention by Bertie Ahern.
Four months on, the virgin fields give little indication of the battle that has raged over the site over the past 10 years.
Local farmer, Patrick McCormack - who was one of the seven action group plaintiffs in the various cases - says: "At this stage, I feel it is time to close the circle and walk away and I don't want to hear about the issue ever again. It has cost us friends, a few good friends who had different opinions and were entitled to their opinions.
"It was the environmental campaign of the last century and I'm glad it is over. The Mullaghmore mountain was the reason I put my holding on the line and I was privileged to do it. Wherever my death bed may be, I will look back on this and say 'I did something right, something of substance'."
What now for the Burren National Park? De Valera says she expects to shortly appoint independent consultants to examine the options for public access and for appropriate control of that access. She says consultants will discuss the matter with Clare County Council officials, and other interested parties, and will factor in their views and concerns in the final report and recommendations.
The Burren Action Group is ready to engage with the proposed process. Colleran says: "The centre should never have been proposed for where it was. But it is wonderful to have a national park and there should be a centre that facilitates it and gives meaning to it for people who visit and it is time to put everything behind us and start afresh."