15/10/2026
STATEMENT: Save Our Bride Otters have applied to the High Court for leave to take a judicial review against what we consider to be an entirely unnecessary destruction of the River Bride in Blackpool by a flood relief option being stubbornly advanced by the OPW.
In the OPW’s experts’ own words, the currently preferred option for flood relief will result in “significant, negative and permanent impacts” on fish, birds, bats and otters. The OPW have spent twelve years advancing the covering over, and entombing, of the River Bride in Blackpool Village, thereby burying Blackpool’s living link to its industrial past and the green and blue artery connected to the heart of our community.
The OPW know that the scheme in its current format is incompatible with European environmental directives that have been transposed into Irish law, but they have nonetheless progressed with it since 2014, in the face of extensive opposition and following our successful 2021 High Court challenge. We believe that the OPW have once again invited our current legal challenge with a substandard and legally flawed proposal.
It bewilders us at Save Our Bride Otters that we are once again placed in this position, when there is a feasible alternative by the OPW’s own assessment and admission. The alternative of storing flood water upstream in the catchment, as has been implemented by the OPW in Clonakilty, is more cost-effective (cheaper) by the OPW’s own estimates, is environmentally friendly, and would be enthusiastically welcomed by all in the Blackpool community. Instead, the OPW have decided to spend in excess of a decade fostering division with a proposal that we feel has been set up to fail in the planning, or consenting, process, thereby denying the residents and businesses of Blackpool the flood relief we need and deserve.
It is extremely expensive to take a court case. We need all the help we can get. We have set up a new GoFundMe page in order to do this. Link here - https://gofund.me/944644bc4
Thank you all.
The Save Our Bride Otters team
14/10/2026
