Old Head Of Kinsale in News Today
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Monday December 16, 2002 13:12
by Shuttin Sionnain!
From FOIE Website / Indo
Club officials believe that if unrestricted public access rights be enforced, the golf operation could not survive the insurance implications and the disruption to its core golfing trade.
THE millionaire developer of Ireland's most exclusive golf course has said that he wouldn't proceed again with the award-winning €15m venture.
John O'Connor, founder of the Old Head of Kinsale Golf Club spoke as a landmark Supreme Court hearing this week on public access demands to the course could redefine Irish private property rights.
Hailed by Links magazine as "the most spectacular course on earth" and by Japanese golf bible, Golf Digest, as "a course in a million", the Old Head's only real rivals now are Scotland's famous St Andrew's and Carnoustie. Yet Ashbourne Holdings boss and Old Head of Kinsale Golf Club President, Mr O'Connor, described the last five years as "a total nightmare" with repeated planning and legal clashes over right of way disputes.
Now, instead of symbolising a proud Irish tourism success story, the Old Head finds itself destined for the Supreme Court this week - after having spent the previous five years fighting planning battles and High Court challenges, first with Cork County Council and now An Bord Pleanala.
"If we lose the Supreme Court hearing then the outcome for us is simple. In the words of Mr Justice Kearns in the High Court, it would make the golf course inoperable," Mr O'Connor said.
At issue is how much access the public should have to the course and the scenic headland. The local authority wants year round supervised access to the headland - but the golf course founders appealed that ruling to the High Court.
The High Court ruled in favour of the golf course but that is now being appealed to the High Court by the council and An Bord Pleanala.
Club officials believe that if unrestricted public access rights be enforced, the golf operation could not survive the insurance implications and the disruption to its core golfing trade.
The looming Supreme Court hearing reflects a legal battle that has been waged up and down Britain for the past two decades - the balance of private property rights with the so-called rights of the rambler. The Old Head course was developed on 40 acres of a spectacular headland jutting straight into the Atlantic. Both ramblers and An Bord Pleanala are adamant that public access through the golf course to the Old Head itself must be guaranteed.
Workers Party official, Ted Tynan, said ordinary people will not be denied access to one of the country's great natural beauty spots.
But John O'Connor disagrees: "When we took over this land, it was covered in gorse and heather so high than you couldn't walk on it," he explained.
Ashbourne Holdings purchased it in 1989 for just £220,000. Now, after a €15m investment, the site has been transformed and 98pc of the course's clientele in 2000 to 2001 came from abroad.
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Comments (4 of 4)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4This sounds like good news and I am proud to have been there a couple of time.
Keep on pushing and they will collapse!
And fuck John O'Connor, The Old head is the loveliest place for a people's picnic!
These O'Connors really know how to sob? After physically trying to take away the rights of
access to the Old Head by fencing it off, they now expect some sympathy from us.
This appeal is clearly to the Establishment and I would'nt be at all surprised if the
judges who afterall serve the elite, grant them the legal right of their theft. This
will then give them the 'right' to criminalize the protestors. Isn't it amazing the way a
few members of the elite, can write down a little note on a bit of paper and use this as
authority to marshall the forces of the state for the benefit of very few to oppose the
rest of us.
Maybe it's time we started writing our own people's laws in the same vein as CopyLeft rights.
It's time to have PropertyLeft as opposed to Property Rights.
On another note, does anyone know what sort of herbicides the Golf course is using, because
most of them are heavy users of the stuff and I am sure it must be leaching out of the place
on all sides and affecting the local bird and marine life.
The owners say that prior to purchase the Old head was un-traversable. This is BS. I, and many others have fond memories of parking on the hill and walking down to the old head it self.
This is a major geographic landmark and to put it out of reach of all is a travesty of near-invader like proportions.
I, as a charterd accountant, do not believe the argument that there business will fail.
Here in the states, jurisdiction after jurisdiction adopts non-smoking laws in the bars, and they all stay open in spite of the same prediction the O'Connors are making.
[Postscript: My Grandfather, Maurice McCarthy, was one of those who helped rescue Lusitania victims. This has nothing to do with the rest, but shows my connection]
FREE THE OLD HEAD