Restrictive planning in Rochfortbridge

Westmeath County Council has said under the upgrade of Rochfortbridge sewerage services, they turned down some planning applications to leave room for employment generating activities and commercial activities.They have set aside a Population Equivalent of 800 for this purpose alone.'There was an old plant there and we are in the process of upgrading it. It will be finished in a few months" time, it is very slow.We have a new plant coming in,' said Ray Kenny, Area Director of Services at last weeks Kilbeggan Area Meeting.'Around this time last year we had a huge amount of planning applications in Rochfortbridge. We looked for an operator to plan for up to 2,500 Population Equivalent (PE), that"s a measure of the amount Rochfortbridge can take as a Phase One, and 4,000 PE as a ball park figure for Phase Two. The Department knocked the higher figure. The Department are looking at the National Development Plan, the National Spacial Strategy, the Regional Plan and the County Development Plan. They are saying "Look, under your County Development Plan, you are to be subservient to the regional planning guidelines, and it shows you are focusing the population growth into the gateway towns." So they constricted us to 2500 PE.'We had about six planning applications for housing development and we looked at them all and they said if we allow the whole lot of them to develop, the thing would be over capacity on day one. So, what we need to do here is to bring order to it and we need to keep a fraction of this capacity for employment generation activities and commercial activities. So we set aside 800 PE for employment generating activities and commercial.'If we were nonsensical enough to grant every planning permission that came in, and then somebody comes into Rochfortbridge and says "I have 100 jobs for Rochfortbridge and I need capacity in your sewerage treatment plant and we weren"t in a position to give it to them, that would not be a comfortable place to be.'We are being restrictive and we make no apology for being restrictive. We have permitted enough housing in Rochfortbridge in my view. We are favouring village centre development and holding a degree of capacity that if somebody comes into Rochfortbridge with jobs, there will be facility for them,' he finished.Pig roast raises big cash for Westmeath HospiceThe Pig Roast at Dalystown was a big success despite the rain that fell last Saturday, with approximately €2,300 raised for the Westmeath Hospice.Organisers were thrilled with the high turnout, which involved members of the local community and curious visitors from as far away as Cork, who returned to Dalystown having seen a sign the week before advertising the roasting of a pig.The biggest amounts of money were raised from a mini-raffle also held on the night, with €300 taken for the best pint of Guinness.There will be a presentation of a cheque to the Westmeath Hospice in the coming weeks.