DUBLIN CITY COUNCIL has given the green light to private school, St Michael’s College, for a new floodlighting system for the school’s sports grounds despite concerns expressed by D4 residents for the Light Bellied Brent Goose and their own residential amenity.

As part of the planning permission, the council attached a condition to ensure that St Michael’s College put in mitigation measures for the protected bird, the Light Bellied Brent Goose.

The fee-paying primary and secondary schools are located on a campus adjacent to Ailesbury Road and Nutley Avenue, catering for 1,000 students and 100 staff in D4.

Planning consultants for applicants, Congregation of the Holy Spirit, told Dublin City Council that the introduction of pitch lighting will enable St Michael’s College to continue to deliver excellence in education, sports and personal development for the school community.

The planned floodlight system comprises five 18.3m high lighting poles to the main synthetic pitch; six 18.3m high lighting poles to the main grass pitch and four 15m high lighting poles to another synthetic training pitch.

In an objection on behalf of 29 householders on Nutley Avenue, it stated “we feel the proposal represents an inappropriate, unjustified and poorly assessed form of development”.

The objection signed off by two Nutley Avenue householders, Declan Kennedy and Declan Corcoran on behalf of their neighbours, contends that the floodlighting system “would irreversibly impair residential amenity, undermine the character and setting of a protected structure, and fail to comply with the requirements of both the Dublin City Development Plan and EU environmental law”.

The objection stated that the introduction of high-intensity floodlighting would give rise to adverse effects on the Light Bellied Brent Goose.

In response to residents’ concerns, the council has included a condition that floodlight operational hours up to 9.30pm “would be appropriate in order to alleviate and reduce potential impacts on residential amenity of the area”.

The planner’s report stated that the council Parks Division is “satisfied that the development will not give rise to any adverse environmental impacts given that the pitches are to be utilised as existing”.

As a result of the residents’ concerns, the council stalled the project earlier this year and requested a number of reports including one concerning Light Bellied Brent Geese use of the St Michael’s College pitch as a feeding area.

In a survey carried out between February and April this year, field ecologist, John Fox indicated that Light-bellied Brent Geese did use the St Michael’s Playing Pitch before that date in 2026.

The report states that the presence of recent and widely distributed Light-bellied Brent Goose droppings on the pitch on 17 February 2026 indicates that geese did graze there in significant numbers before that date.

As part of the planning permission, the council has stated that all mitigation measures identified within the submitted Natura Impact Statement be implemented fully to avoid any impact.

In the NIS, Openfield Ecological Services stated that given the significance of the amenity grassland playing pitch for Light-bellied Brent Goose, Curlew and Black-headed Gull this could, in the absence of mitigation, contribute to a temporary decline in numbers of those species.

In the report, Pádraic Fogarty states that construction works at pitch two will not occur during the wintering bird season from October to March inclusive, as this will ensure that disturbance and displacement is avoided.