Remote Irish Seaside Village Fights Developer’s Plan for Yacht Marina

A crooked path runs out to the edge of the Old World. There is a solitary stone tower set on a grassy knoll, facing darkening water and the end of it all.

The hands of time have left this gentle village of 1,200 untouched since settlers first raised walls against the wind, rain and isolation of the Dingle Peninsula centuries ago.

But the world as we know it is closing in like an oil spill on Dingle, a close-knit community with one church, 52 pubs and sturdy folk with a love for nature’s gifts.

An Irish developer has announced plans to build a 300-berth yacht marina and 40 holiday homes in Dingle Harbor, igniting a legal war with residents who fear that mass tourism will shatter their quiet way of life.

Xavier McAuliffe, the developer, says the $10.5-million complex will draw wealthy tourists and pump up the area’s sagging economy.

Villagers contend that the project will set in motion a sprawl of other developments along the peninsula, drive up taxes and lead to higher crime.

Most of all, they say, a necklace of condominiums along the coast would spoil the exquisite beauty of western Ireland, kill its rustic charm and make off-limits shores that have been public as long as anyone can remember.

Oddly enough, it was a gift from nature, a bottlenose dolphin of 13 feet, that brought all the trouble.

No one knows why or how the dolphin surfaced in Dingle Bay in 1983. The waters are frigid most of the year and schools of killer whales prowl the entrance to the bay.

Fungie, Gaelic slang for beard, named after the fisherman who spotted him, soon won over the fishermen with his playful antics.

Film crews made the dolphin a star with documentaries such as “The Dolphin’s Gift,” narrated by actor John Hurt.

Fungie’s fame put Dingle on tourist maps and attracted the idle rich: The number of sightseers tripled to 350,000 a year, including 5,000 tourists a day in the summer.

It also drew developers such as McAuliffe, who built a luxury, 75-room hotel and tennis courts on the banks of the sound in the mid-1980s.

The shot heard around Dingle came in 1990, when McAuliffe announced that he was expanding his hotel and building the marina complex along 22 acres of public waterfront.

It wasn’t the first time an outsider had tried to exploit Dingle Harbor. In 1984, villagers joined forces to defeat a state proposal to use the harbor to breed mussels and salmon.

This time, they formed a citizens group and got 800 of Dingle’s 1,200 residents to sign a petition condemning the project. At a raucous public forum in June, 1991, 75 townsfolk decried the marina. Two defended it.

Tempers rose when the government awarded McAuliffe $3.6 million to start construction. The 12-nation European Community later chipped in $2 million, and the Marine Ministry gave its approval on Dec. 13.

Sixteen days later, 1,500 people--ranks swelled by locals across the Dingle Peninsula and a grammar school marching band--marched through the town with placards reading “Politics Versus People” and “No More Havens for the Rich.”

The issue grabbed national headlines in February when 270 villagers made the 180-mile trip to Dublin and protested against the development outside the Irish Parliament.

“Nobody wants to live in a holiday resort with hotels boarded up out of season, shabby amusement arcades, mothballed yachts in Rottweiler-patrolled marinas, or lousy, potholed car parks,” Leahy said.

There’s no question that the battle has jarred the hearts and minds of Dingle’s residents.

Villagers call Dingle “the last Celtic outpost in Europe.” Con Moriarty, nicknamed the “Mountain Man” because of his walking tours of the Dingle Peninsula, says the description is apt.

The town draws its share of “famous folk” too: Actress Julia Roberts came to Dingle last year to dodge reporters after finishing the movie “Hook.” Her traveler’s check is mounted on the wall of the hostel where she stayed.

Residents beam when telling how “Ryan’s Daughter” was filmed here, or the time Tom Cruise tipped his first beer in a Dingle pub during filming of “Far and Away,” the story of a young Irishman who decides to emigrate to the United States.

For now, Dingle has no traffic lights, no fast-food joints. The only corporate logo in town is Guinness, the only crime a minor tax fraud. Visitors alone lock their car doors.

Villagers, though, now worry that a massive marina complex may discourage the tourists it hopes to attract.

“Dingle’s attraction is its rural beauty,” said Maura Long, as she poured a mug of Guinness ale for a customer at her family’s pub.

Some in Dingle, of course, welcome the development.

Gary O’Boyle, a 23-year-old fisherman, said: “Tourism brings business. I would love to see 10 marinas in there. We’ve had enough young people who have emigrated.”