Deseree Stukes ([email protected])
Sat, 23 Jan 1999 06:31:26 -0500
Lansdowne gigs get green light
By JOHN MADDOCK
ROCK concerts can be held at Dublin's Lansdowne Road without planning
permission, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously yesterday.
The five-judge court overturned last year's High Court ruling in favour of
Dublin Corporation that planning permission was necessary before concerts
could be held at the venue. Some local residents also opposed gigs being
held there.
Mr Justice Hugh O'Flaherty said the case was concerned purely with Lansdowne
Road the home of Irish rugby and while it might have some relevance for two
similar Dublin arenas, Croke Park and the RDS, it had nothing to ``say'' to
smaller venues.
DISPUTE
There had been mention in the course of evidence about certain greyhound
tracks which would, in the normal way, hold 7,000 or 8,000 and at a stretch,
if the track itself were availed of, might accommodate 20,000. But this case
had nothing to say on that situation.
Mr Justice O'Flaherty continued: ``It is concerned with a ground with a
spectator capacity of about 40,000 people and, to repeat myself, is
concerned with the single, solitary question of how the planning code
impinges on the holding of such events as pop concerts in this particular
ground.''
On the application of Colm Allen SC, for the IRFU, costs of both the High
Court and Supreme Court hearings were allowed to the rugby authorities.
The dispute over whether planning permission was needed for Lansdowne Road
followed a High Court ruling in 1996 over such a requirement for concerts at
Slane.
Dublin Corporation stated planning permission was required for a Celine Dion
concert in the rugby ground. Promoter Oliver Barry had also agreed to hold
two U2 concerts at Lansdowne Road in 1997. An accommodation was reached
under which the Dublin band's gigs went ahead.
GYRATIONS
Last February, the High Court declared that the use of the Lansdowne grounds
for rock concerts and other musical events and/or non-sporting events
constituted development within the meaning of the 1963 planning legislation
for which permission was required.
The IRFU claimed staging concerts at its ground did not involve an
unauthorised use because it involved no change from the pre-1964 authorised
use as a national public stadium.
Mr Justice O'Flaherty said it was solely the alteration, level and duration
of the noise during the U2 concerts that brought the High Court to the
conclusion that a material change of use was involved from the holding of
sporting events.
He added that he was of the view that the basis on which the trial judge
decided the case the matter of noise was, in a planning context, of no
relevance.
One might as well say that crowd noise at a soccer game was greater than at
a rugby match. No one would suggest there was a difference in the use of the
stadium between the two types of sport simply because of such a difference
in noise levels.
Mr Justice O'Flaherty said while concerts did not take place at Lansdowne
Road prior to 1964, other musical events did. A concert was very different
from the more restrained performances of those far-off days.
He added: ``Now there is much more action on the stage, with much gyrations
by the performers; a degree of audience participation in the agony and
ecstasy that these events tend to precipitate; and without any doubt, much
greater amplification.
``Life, however, does not stand still. The game of rugby itself and its
ethos has no doubt undergone profound changes since 1964.''
If in October 1964 an informed observer was asked what use was made of
Lansdowne Road, that person would surely reply ``for the playing of rugby
and on occasion also for other sporting, social and musical events''. The
judge referred to various events other than rugby held at the ground since
1876.
Mr Justice O'Flaherty said the basis of his judgment was that the normal use
for the land was for the playing of rugby; other occasional uses were made
in the past and, therefore, were permitted for the present and for the
future under section 40 of the 1963 Act.
He added that as a matter of good citizenry as well as preserving the rights
of the residents, it was important for the future that noise level
requirements should be observed.
In a separate judgment, Mr Justice Keane referred to the holding of the
`Ultimate Event' with Frank Sinatra, Liza Minelli and Sammy Davis Jnr at
Lansdowne Road in 1989 and five other concerts there Michael Jackson, Voices
of the World, Celine Dion and U2.
He said it was not in dispute that the legislature had provided machinery
intended to ensure the protection of people attending such an event and the
public in general including, in particular, local residents from the various
hazards to which such events inevitably gave rise.
``But the character of the use to which the stadium is put cannot, it seems
to me, be regarded as being materially altered in planning terms by such
fleeting changes in its use, the duration of which, over a period nine
years, did not exceed in total more than a few days,'' he added.
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