Way is cleared for three new Navan schools

The green light for a major education campus at Johnstown in Navan was given this week when two objectors to a proposed compulsory purchase order (CPO) on land in the area withdrew their objections in the middle of a Bórd Pleanála hearing in the town. The major hurdle to the provision of badly-needed schools was removed yesterday (Tuesday) when the owner of 24 acres of land at Johnstown - where the Department of Education plans to build three new schools - withdrew her objection to the Navan Town Council CPO. She was quickly followed by another objector who is leasing a separate parcel of land in the area, when he, too, pulled his objection. The council wants the land to provide an education campus in the area, which will include a new national and secondary school as well as accommodation for St Mary's Special School. The issue will now revert to Navan Town Council and the CPO will now go through, clearing the way for the building of a primary, post-primary and special school. Cllr Jenny McHugh, principal of St Stephen's NS in Johnstown, and the Mayor of Navan, Cllr Anton McCabe, who attended an An Bórd Pleanála oral hearing at the Ardboyne Hotel, stressed the "critical" need for new schools for the area. They said that 250 children were being baptised each year in Johnstown parish, resulting in a "huge surge" of enrolments at the current St Stephen's School, which is temporarily housed in the former St Martha's College building. The urgency of providing an education campus in the area was also stressed by Department of Education officials at the opening of the Navan hearing. The hearing at the Ardboyne Hotel, conducted by Bord Pleanala inspector Stephen Kay, was told that the only primary school in the Johnstown area was capable of catering for about 110 junior infants this year but, over the next few years, the number of junior infants in the area would grow from 222 to 263 each year. However, there was a surprise development at the hearing when lawyers for one of the objectors to the compulsory purchase order (CPO), Catriona Cleary, owner of the land at Johnstown, withdrew the objection. Her representative said that she had allowed a premises on the land to be used for a school for six years without charging rent. She had had ongoing discussions with the Department of Education about the land over a number of years and had been offended by the way the matter had panned out. Her objection to the proposed CPO was motivated by the unfair way the CPO had been presented. Senior Counsel Michael Howard said: "She accepts and endorses the use of this property for the provision of schools. She withdraws her objection and asks you, inspector, to endorse the CPO. We are now supporting the CPO, not objecting to it," he said. A second objection to the CPO by Edmund Curtis, Rathkenny, lessee of lands at Johnstown, was withdrawn later in the hearing yesterday afternoon. Earlier, an application by his representatives for an adjournment of the hearing on the basis that the CPO was "unnecessary" was refused by the inspector. Cllr Shane Cassells said the withdrawal of the objections was "a massive step forward for the children of Navan". Cllr McHugh and McCabe thanked Mrs Cleary for her supoport for the school since its inception in 2003 and thanked herself and the other objector for withdrawing their objections. Two officials of the Department of Education and Skills, Tony Dalton and Gavan O'Leary of the planning and building unit, stressed the significant increase in Navan's population resulting in increased demand for school places at both primary and post-primary levels. They said a site was "urgently needed" to develop a permanent national school building. St Mary's Special School was located in an interim premises in Johnstown and needed "a permanent, purpose-built building", while the department's intention was to build a new post-primary school in Johnstown because of the build-up in tthe schoolgoing population in the area. The greatest increase in demand for enrolment was in the greater Dublin area and its outer rim, extending to Gorey, Carlow, Portlaoise, Tullamore, Mullingar, Navan and up to Dundalk, and taking in most towns within that ring. They said there were 20 primary schools within the Navan post-primary feeder area. The 10-year enrolment trend for these schools showed that enrolment at primary level had increased by 1,800 pupils. "The future projected increase in primary enrolments in the area by the year 2017 is 1,404 pupils, which equates to the need for an additional 50 mainstream classrooms, based on a pupil-teacher ratio of 28:1," the officials said.