Sir, - It is only to be expected that Jack O'Connor would say (April 17th) that "golf courses do not destroy landscape and environment". After all, he is a landscape consultant heavily involved with golf-course developments. However, it should be self-evident that golf courses can result in major changes to the way land is managed and can damage landscape, wildlife and archaeological interests.
The construction of golf courses in such highly fragile environments as sand dunes is an obvious instance of this. However, it is the impact of golf course development on historic landscapes, especially Carton, which principally concerned John Ducie (April 10th). None of his justified concerns were dealt with by Mr O'Connor, who ducked the issue by dwelling on the "significant amounts of money" that he claimed were being spent "by developers in preserving wildlife areas and in creating new ones such as woodlands and lakes".
As someone involved for some years in studying the post-medieval landscape in Ireland, I can say that Carton is by far the most important designed landscape ever to have been created in this island. It is the only Irish parkland that can in any way be remotely compared with the great landscape achievements of Stowe and Blenheim. Its importance lies not just in its size (though it is indeed one of the largest parks in Ireland) but in the exceptionally high quality of its landscaping - the product of millions of manhours of labour, moving earth, levelling ground, widening rivers, digging lakes and planting trees. Other informal 18th-century parklands in Ireland relied heavily upon tree planting for their effect, but at Carton the topography of the landscape itself is artificial.
Furthermore, Carton also contains a remarkable range of parkland buildings - the Shell Cottage, the Ornamental Dairy and the Rye Water Bridge being especially noteworthy. While it is true that Carton has suffered neglect at the hands of successive owners since the 1930s, it nonetheless has survived remarkably intact.
The very idea that this great jewel in the heritage of Ireland is about to be destroyed to make way for at least two golf courses, a vast hotel and many hundreds of houses is quite appalling and an indictment of the planning process (or lack of it) in the Republic of Ireland. The damage that the hotel and suburban housing would cause to Carton needs little explanation, but it must be recognised that the golf courses are themselves designed landscapes and will inevitably involve fundamentally altering the existing landscape with earth-moving, especially in the creation of terraces, digging new lakes and raising banks.
New tree-planting, bearing no relation to the historic planting, will also result, especially in the need to screen holes from each other. The visual impact of sand bunkers and of contrasting mowing regimes and grass species will also harm the character and appearance of the 18th-century parkland at Carton. The whole situation is made even worse by the fact that no fieldwork and research of the designed landscape has been carried out by a garden historian or a garden archaeologist.
In the 19th century the Dukes of Leinster, allowed all visitors free and open access to the demesne. It is only in our own egalitarian age that the gates have been shut to visitors. I believe that the Irish State has a responsibility to protect Carton and should be prepared to purchase the property, restore it to its former glory and allow the public access once again. Indeed, if properly conserved, the landscape park at Carton (together with the nearby house at Castletown) could be confidently proposed as a World Heritage Site, as the British Government have recently done for Mount Stewart in Northern Ireland. - Yours, etc.,
Terence Reevessmyth, Glenoe Village, Larne, Co Antrim.