The Irish Times

This week's revelation that Foxrock Golf Club had been told it would soon be receiving a written offer worth €400 million from developers for its 50-acre site on Torquay Road will have dismayed residents of one of Dublin's most sought-after suburbs - not least architect Ronnie Tallon, whose serene modernist home overlooks the golf course. Everyone is tight-lipped about who will make this offer. It is known that Treasury Holdings has been talking to a number of golf clubs in Dublin, having "banked" planning permission for two courses at Milverton, in Skerries, and bought Galen Weston's land at Roundwood, Co Wicklow, for another pair. Attention was focusing yesterday on Castlethorn Construction (run by Dundrum Town Centre developer Joe O'Reilly), which recently bought land adjoining Woodbrook Golf Club in Bray, Co Wicklow, or the Cosgrave brothers, who engineered a controversial deal to relocate Dún Laoghaire Golf Club. With the exponential increase in land values, green acres can no longer be taken for granted anywhere in the capital. Foxrock golf club's 580 members must be slavering at the prospect of windfall gains as well as the promise that a new course and clubhouse would be built for them at another location.