A capacity crowd turned out at Greystones Rugby Club in Co Wicklow last night to hear arguments against a planned €300 million redevelopment scheme for the town's crumbling harbour which dates from the early 1880s.
Opening the meeting, Evelyn Cawley, a former Greystones councillor and leading member of the Greystones Protection and Development Committee, said it was clear from the large turnout that the protest meeting could have been held on the rugby pitches.
She said the large numbers should send a clear message to Greystones town councillors, Wicklow County Council management and Minister for the Environment Dick Roche that "the scale and size of the harbour marina development was unwanted".
Addressing the crowd of about 400, Ms Cawley also produced a constituency newsletter circulated by Mr Roche which, she said, "completely ignored the most important local issue".
At issue is Wicklow County Council's plans for a 375-apartment, 230-berth marina with 6,400 sq m of commercial, mainly marine-related, units. Also planned is a boardwalk and a 15-acre park.
The council is currently moving ahead with compulsory purchase orders for 40 acres around the harbour, including the foreshore, which it proposes to transfer to its private-sector partner, the Sispar consortium.
In return for the land on which it will build the apartments, Sispar will carry out a major refurbishment of the harbour, and put in coastal protection works, a marina and facilities for existing harbour users.
Photographs of the existing marine views from properties around the harbour, coupled with computer-generated images of the apartment blocks, were circulated at last night's meeting.
Committee member Joe Carthy said construction would be a major disturbance in the area for five years, and he cited the council's own traffic management plans which, he said, showed the local roads could not handle the construction traffic involved.