AARHUS: - There is still support for the settlement that has been reached, which includes a port expansion. It is clear that this is subject to the condition that the Danish Transport Authority approves what is on the table.
This is what Aarhus' mayor Jacob Bundsgaard (S) told DR after a settlement meeting on Monday.
The reason why the settlement parties - Venstre, SF, Conservatives and the Social Democrats - met was that the Planning Complaints Board last week rejected the local plan and environmental report that was available. "The environmental assessment suffers from a significant legal deficiency," the board wrote in its ruling.
But these are just formal errors, says the mayor now after the meeting. Here he and the settlement parties were presented with the Technical and Environmental Administration's report on the case.
The race ahead
Overall, it says that the documents for the local plan themselves had shortcomings, but that the overall case material thoroughly explained the case as a whole.
Two of the problems that caused the Planning Appeals Board to reject the local plan were, firstly, that parts of the case material - including needs analyses - were not included in the actual plan documents submitted to the board, and secondly, that the over 600-page environmental impact report from the Danish Transport Authority had not been awaited.
- But we have run ahead of that, says Jacob Bundsgaard to Aarhus Stiftstidende.
"Technology and Environment did not take a specific position on whether the environmental assessment of the local plan constituted a sufficiently independent basis", states the briefing from the meeting with the conciliation group. The majority of the environmental assessment came from the Danish Transport Authority, but it was not ready.
There was a need to revise the environmental impact report, which is why it had to be re-heard. The consultation period expired on 31 May 2024, three days after the Planning Appeals Board's decision.
While we wait for the Danish Transport Authority
Since there is still support for an expansion, a new local plan will be made for the area. This time, says the Aarhus mayor, the new local plan will be made until the Danish Transport Authority has made a decision.
During the consultation, 969 consultation responses were received, which the authority will now have to sift through. The Danish Transport Authority can then assess whether the Port of Aarhus can fill the bay with soil, and thus give the green light for the port expansion.
Normally, such a large local plan takes an extremely long time to make. But the mayor believes that the work can be done relatively quickly.
- It will not take as long as it did at first, because we have all the material we need. But there are a number of formal requirements for consultation deadlines, and we also need to be absolutely sure that we have confidence in all the professionalism in what is coming now. So it will postpone the process by at least half a year to a full year from the time the Danish Transport Authority makes the decision, he tells DR.
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