The Burren Action Group are a group of people from

County Clare County Clare ( ga, Contae an Chláir) is a county in Ireland, in the Southern Region and the province of Munster, bordered on the west by the Atlantic Ocean. Clare County Council is the local authority. The county had a population of 118,817 ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

who opposed plans by the

Office of Public Works The Office of Public Works (OPW) ( ga, Oifig na nOibreacha Poiblí) (legally the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland) is a major Irish Government agency, which manages most of the Irish State's property portfolio, including hundreds of ow ...

during the 1990s to develop a large scale interpretative centre at

Mullaghmore Mullaghmore may refer to the following places in Ireland: General * Mullaghmore, County Clare, a limestone hill * Mullaghmore Peninsula, a peninsula in County Sligo ** Mullaghmore, County Sligo, a village on the Mullaghmore Peninsula * Mullaghmore, ...

in the local Burren area.

Goal

The Group was a collective of concerned locals who fought to maintain the natural integrity of the landscape and to protect the environment from elements of the

Government of Ireland The Government of Ireland ( ga, Rialtas na hÉireann) is the cabinet that exercises executive authority in Ireland. The Constitution of Ireland vests executive authority in a government which is headed by the , the head of government. The governm ...

which did not understand what was at stake. They also felt that the Burren and the area of Mullaghmore is a "sacred site" and holy ground that needed to be defended in a country whose sites of profound historical importance are rapidly disappearing.

History

In 1992/1993 seven members of the group lodged a complaint against the project with the

Irish High Court The High Court ( ga, An Ard-Chúirt) of Ireland is a court which deals at first instance with the most serious and important civil and criminal cases. When sitting as a criminal court it is called the Central Criminal Court and sits with judg ...

, which resulted in work being stopped. These seven included local farmers like James Howard and Patrick McCormack, priest Fr. John O’Donohue, Prof. Emer Colleran as well as media figures like the producer P.J. Curtis or

Lelia Doolan Lelia Doolan (born 1934) is an Irish television producer. Doolan was born in Cork in 1934. She studied French and German at University College Dublin, where she won a scholarship to study at the Brecht Theatre in Germany. She presented and acte ...

. The Burren Action Group was also supported by leftist politicians like

Brigid Makowski Brigid Makowski (''née'' Sheils) was a former member of Shannon, County Clare, Shannon Town Commission and Clare County Council. She was elected initially representing the Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP) of which she was a founding memb ...

. Following about ten years of opposition, the group was finally successful in March 2000.

An Bord Pleanála (; meaning "The Planning Board"; ABP) is an independent, statutory, quasi-judicial body that decides on appeals from planning decisions made by local authorities in the Republic of Ireland. As of 2007, An Bord Pleanála directly decided major ...

confirmed the ruling by the

Clare County Council Clare County Council ( ga, Comhairle Contae an Chláir) is the authority responsible for local government in County Clare, Ireland. As a county council, it is governed by the Local Government Act 2001. The council is responsible for housing and ...

to refuse planning permission for a scaled-down version of the original plans. In 2012, James Howard and Patrick McCormack, the latter owner of the house that featured as the parochial house in the

Father Ted ''Father Ted'' is a sitcom created by Irish writers Graham Linehan and Arthur Mathews (writer), Arthur Mathews and produced by British production company Hat Trick Productions for Channel 4. It aired over three series from 21 April 1995 until ...

TV show, once again opposed a new application to construct a car park at the site of the planned visitors' centre.

Fundraising

The Burren Action Group compiled a

music album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early 20th century as individual 78 rpm records coll ...

in the early 1990s, entitled ''Music in the Stone'' to raise money to save Mullaghmore because ''"...the wheels of greed are rolling towards it"''.Music in the Stone
April 1993.

References

External links

Burren Action Group website
Environmental organisations based in Ireland {{environmental-org-stub