Campaigners vow to keep up legal fight
Labour's Eamon Gilmore blasted Martin Cullen's move yesterday.
Fine Gael's Olivia Mitchell said the minister had taken the only sensible option available.
Mr Cullen rejected appeals from campaigners seeking to preserve the south Dublin site.
Protesters at the site had halted the major construction project promoted by the Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council.
Mr Cullen said that the council's compromise plan will preserve parts of the site but not the castle's perimeter wall.
More than 130 archaeologists have been employed on the Carrickmines site at a cost of €6m to the State.
Mr Cullen said 17 of the 23 submissions examined by the department in relation to the site supported the completion of the motorway.
"It has been satisfactorily demonstrated that a systematic approach has been adopted by the council to the archaeological resolution of the Carrickmines sites," he said.
Campaigners, however, insisted the entire site could be preserved if the road was slightly redirected.
The Green Party claimed significant damage will be caused to the medieval remains but Fine Gael's Olivia Mitchell said the minister had taken the only sensible option open to him in allowing the council to interfere with a national monument.
The Dublin South TD said that notwithstanding the fact the council emphatically deny there was any such monument, the compromise option was the only way to end the costly and time-consuming impasse.
Mr Gilmore criticised the minister's decision to approve the bulldozing of the site on the last day of the Dáil before the summer recess.
"Preventing any debate in the Dáil is scandalously undemocratic," he said.
"Other options were open to the Minister. It's a serious mistake and it means that this issue will almost inevitably end back up in the courts."
The Carrickmines Castle Preservation Group said the minister's approval for the destruction of Carrickmines Castle was illogical and possibly illegal.
The group's spokesman Vincent Salafia said: "We are very disappointed as the decision opens the door to possibly years of litigation and delays costing millions.
"We presented the minister with a perfectly reasonable alternative plan two months ago which would have avoided all of this."
He added: "This week, we received a letter stating he was too busy to meet us now he will possibly be meeting us in court."
